Media Release- Saturday January 10, 2009 – Australasian College of Skin Cancer Medicine
At present there are nipper programs running on beaches throughout our country. Despite aims of health and safety for our children the nippers programs fail the sun safe test. The Australasian College of Skin Cancer Medicine (ACSCM) urges these programs to rethink sun safety.
Programs are frequently undertaken at the worst time of the day for ultraviolet B (UVB) exposure. We know that excessive sun exposure should be avoided between 11 AM and 2 PM but these hours are common for nippers programs and events.
The children are often wearing scanty clothes. There is usually no compulsion by nippers programs that the children must wear rash vests even though most nippers are provided with them. The rash vests provided are generally short sleeved where they could be long sleeved.
Nippers, in contrast, are generally required to wear historic caps that maximise UV exposure to the face and ears. We are told that this is for team identification purposes.
Associate Professor (Cutaneous Oncology), Dr. Anthony Dixon comments, “Rather than the caps, why not require the children to wear the provided club rash vest for all nippers events? The children’s team will be identifiable, their skin better protected, and the sponsors of the rash vests will have greater exposure. – Everyone wins”
Broad brimmed hats are fundamental to UV protection. While nippers have many garments sponsored and provided to them by surf clubs, appropriate hats seem to be forgotten. Dr. Dixon said today, “Surf clubs should place a priority on providing sponsored broad brimmed hats to all nippers”.
Surf clubs should think about the time of day for scheduled nipper events. Dr. Dixon explained, “Why not hold training sessions between 9 and 11 AM or between 3 and 5 PM. Just changing the timing of sessions away from the peak UV hours will dramatically reduce our children’s UV exposure”.
This photo was taken on Friday Jan 9 just after Noon at Torquay, Victoria. Note the limited clothes on most children. The marshals are effective in organising the children into groups and lines but not effective at policing sun safety.
ACSCM suggests improvements to Nipper programs:
· Whenever possible, run Nippers programs prior to 11 AM and after 2 PM
· Rash vests, (preferably long sleeved) must be worn by participating children. No vest = no participation
· Broad brimmed hats must be worn between events. Not hat = no participation
· Organisers ensure sunscreen is reapplied whenever sessions are longer than 2 hours
Key facts:
· Melanoma is the commonest invasive malignancy in Australians aged 15 to 24
o In Europe it does not even make the top 5
· Melanoma is caused by excessive UV exposure some years prior to diagnosis
o we are currently subjecting 5 to 14 year old Australians to excessive UV
· Australia’s highest UV B levels are between 11 AM and 2 PM
· The worst months in the year in Australia are December and January
· Rash vests and broad brimmed hats are effective at blocking ultraviolet
· More Australians die on our beaches from skin cancer than shark attacks or drowning