GETTING BURNT....

... and not just by the sun.

In New Zealand, skin cancers outrank other cancers by about 4 to one. Each year 67,000 new registrations are reported. More than 300 New Zealanders die each year from skin cancer and we have the highest rate of melanoma in the world. Skin cancer has been estimated to cost over 33 million dollars a year.

New Zealand's high skin cancer rates are due to:

·      the high levels of UV rays during daylight savings months

·      low ozone levels over New Zealand

·      our outdoor lifestyle and tendency to ‘seek the sun'

·      the high proportion of people with fair skin

Yet, skin cancer is readily preventable through covering up when in the sun and using SP15 minimum sunscreen. Most peple know this as there have been many campaigns run by the Cancer Society over many years and of course good common sense. Parents should slap on sunscreen on their kids through all summer months and adults playing or working in the sun should do so also. So why don’t they? Have you checked out the price of sunscreen in the shops and supermarkets? For the price of one small container you can feed a family of six for several days. I am not surprised that it is not seen much in supermarket trolleys and why it makes up such a small space on supermarket shelves – sometimes being hard to find. So why are sunscreens so expensive? In a UK investigation Kate Clark, spokesperson for Ambre Solaire said it is down to expensive research. 'We spend millions of pounds on research and development every year, upgrading technology and looking for new types of filters, textures and formulations. We want to give the consumer a product that is completely safe but also something that they enjoy using.' However, Ian White, consultant dermatologist at St John's Institute of Dermatology in London, says there is no justification for such expense. 'The cost of these products is exorbitant,' he says. 'Sunscreens are not expensive to manufacture but the companies which make them use the fact that we must buy them for the sake of our health to their advantage….As far as research goes, there are just 12 active ingredients on the approved European list, out of which four or five are particularly popular - so there are limited combinations which all manufacturers must use, anyway.”

Basically what he and other critics are saying is that the drug companies argument on having to recoup expensive research costs is a crock of shit. The active ingredients have been known for a long time and have been in use for many years. Basically they keep the price up so high because they can as it is a product that is needed.

What I can’t understand is that as it costs the country so much in direct and indirect (lost working days eg.) costs why isnt sunscreen subsidised?