R UV Ugly?
Before visiting a tanning salon, it’s really worth considering the facts about how sunbeds can damage your appearance – and your health.
The 'R UV UGLY' campaign aimed to highlight the skin damage, premature ageing and health dangers associated with using sunbeds.
Check out more information about the campaign below.
Cancer Research UK's R UV UGLY campaign ran during winter 2011/12. We called on young Britons to face the invisible damage being inflicted on their skin by sunbeds.
The campaign targeted young people aged 16-18, as well as older people aged 28-44 (e.g. mums and sisters), as research had shown they can often influence young people’s attitudes and behaviour towards using sunbeds.
Cancer Research UK teamed up with the UK’s No.1 skin clinic, ‘Sk:n’, to offer two free UV skin scans to sunbed users. This allowed young sunbed users and older ‘influencers’ of sunbed users to see the hidden damage lurking beneath the skin’s surface. The hi-tech scans provided an uncompromising close-up of what skin really looks like, revealing wrinkles, areas of dehydration, sunspots and damage caused by over-exposure to UV rays from sunbeds and the sun.
As well as promoting the free skin scans through the media and the Cancer Research UK Facebook page, Open Days were carried out in Sk:n clinics all over the country and a special 'UV Photobooth' visited shopping centres in Manchester and Newcastle.
For more information about the campaign contact the SunSmart team.
- Sunbeds are not a safe alternative to tanning outdoors.
- Sunbeds give out UV rays which damage the DNA in your skin cells. Over time, this damage can build up and may eventually lead to skin cancer.
- Experts recently moved sunbeds from the ‘probably carcinogenic’ category to ‘carcinogenic’. This puts sunbeds in the same category as tobacco, alcohol and asbestos.
- Young people are particularly at risk – people who first use a sunbed before the age of 35 have a 75% increased risk of developing melanoma, the most serious type of skin cancer.
- It’s not only so called ‘binge tanners’ who are putting themselves in danger. Using a sunbed just once a month or more can increase the risk of melanoma by more than half.
If you must have a tan then it is safer to get it from a bottle. Watch R UV UGLY? supporter and Made In Chelsea star Binky Felstead visit her local beauty salon and give her top tips on applying fake tan.
More detailed information about sunbeds is available on the sunbeds page of the SunSmart website.
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