Sunbed Association’s ‘safe tan’ advice is not correct, according to experts

The Sunbed Association’s website contains incorrect health advice on tanning, according to health authorities and experts in the UK and worldwide.

While researching another fact check about the dangers of sunbeds, we noticed the following line on the FAQs page of the Sunbed Association, which represents the interests of tanning salons in the UK:

This is not correct, according to the NHS and a wide range of health authorities and experts.

Scientists don’t know everything about the exact relationship between melanoma (a dangerous form of skin cancer) and UV light (from indoor tanning or from the sun), but there is already enough evidence to establish a consensus that tanning meaningfully raises the risk of cancer.

So when the Sunbed Association suggests there is such a thing as a safe tan, it is contradicting many of the most respected scientific authorities around the world, including:

• The NHS, which says “there’s no safe or healthy way to get a tan”.
• The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), which says “there is no safe or healthy way to get a tan from sunlight”.
• The European Commission, which says “the only safe way to use [sunbeds] is not to use them at all”.
• The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which says “controlled tanning is not safe tanning”.
• The US Food and Drug Administration, which says “there is no such thing as a safe tan”.
• Cancer Research UK, which says “there’s no such thing as safe UV tanning".

When we contacted the British Association of Dermatologists (BAD), it told us: “There is no safe way to get a tan. Whether from the sun or a sunbed, a tan is a visible sign that your skin has been damaged by ultraviolet (UV) radiation, which increases your risk of skin cancer.”

Sophie Brooks, health information manager at Cancer Research UK, also told us: “There’s no such thing as safe tanning from UV radiation. A tan is a sign of skin damage and offers very little protection against the sun—some studies estimate that tanned skin offers a sun protection factor (SPF) of around 3, which isn’t enough to protect your skin.

“A bit of sun helps our bodies make vitamin D, but there’s no need to sunbathe or risk sunburn to get enough vitamin D. Too much sun can cause sunburn and increase the risk of skin cancer.”

What the Sunbed Association says

When we contacted the Sunbed Association, it told us that in its view a controlled tan slightly increases the skin’s protection against further UV damage. When we asked for evidence that this tan itself did not raise the risk of cancer, it sent us references to several scientific papers and said it believed these demonstrated that "a consensus view based on flawed and/or selective data simply enables the established narrative to continue".

But the evidence the association provided does not prove that the consensus is flawed, in our assessment, and in a separate assessment by Kevin McConway, Professor Emeritus of Applied Statistics at the Open University and an adviser to the Full Fact board’s fact checking sub group. The Sunbed Association did provide some studies that failed to prove that professional sunbeds raise the risk of cancer. But a failure to find something doesn't necessarily mean it's not there.

And in this case, the studies the association mentioned were not in our assessment reliable guides to the risks in the real world. Much of the same evidence was also submitted to a European Commission consultation on the safety of sunbeds, which did not change its view as a result.

We also shared the Sunbed Association’s response with the BAD, which told us: “The evidence provided by the Sunbed Association does not cast significant doubt on the established scientific consensus that there is no such thing as a safe tan. While it emphasises that tanning is a biological response that may confer a small degree of protection against sunburn, it does not address the underlying fact that a tan is itself a marker of DNA damage from ultraviolet radiation, which is the mechanism by which skin cancer risk increases.

“The modest SPF of roughly 2–4 [that] a tan offers is far too low to provide meaningful protection, and comes only after damage has already occurred. The concept of a “base tan” preventing burning is therefore not considered a safe or effective strategy by any independent cancer‐prevention authority…

“The Sunbed Association’s critique of existing evidence relies heavily on selective interpretations of limited data, and does not overturn the strong, consistent evidence base from large bodies of epidemiological and mechanistic research.

“By contrast, the wider evidence base, reflected in positions from the World Health Organisation, NHS, and expert groups including the British Association of Dermatologists and British Photodermatology Group, shows that UV exposure from both sunlight and sunbeds is carcinogenic, and there is no such thing a safe, risk-free suntan.”

Advertising rulings

Bad health information can be very dangerous. In this case, if people believe that tanning can be safe—or even beneficial, as the Sunbed Association claims—they may be more likely to visit tanning salons and put themselves at greater risk of cancer.

When we asked the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) about this, it told us it has made a number of recent rulings against sunbed-related companies for suggesting their services were safe or beneficial. It also issued an advice notice in February, saying: “As public health bodies consistently advise, there is no safe way to tan using UV radiation and UV rays given out by sunbeds increases the risk of developing skin cancer.”

Also in February, BBC News reported that it found more than 200 examples of ads from tanning salons making misleading claims about sunbeds.

The ASA said that it will require all advertisers to review their online and offline content to ensure they:

• Do not claim that using a sunbed is "safe".
• Do not make claims that using a sunbed has health benefits, including that it can increase vitamin D, boost mood or energy or improve eczema.
• Do not claim that using a sunbed can help with health conditions which require medical supervision, such as psoriasis, seasonal affective disorder (SAD), depression, osteoporosis or Alzheimer's disease, unless it's being supervised by a suitably qualified medical professional.

The ASA also told us that it was liaising with the Sunbed Association to “ensure that they are made aware of the requirements and expectations”. The authority also said that the association’s FAQs page was likely to be within its remit.