What is X?

If I spend 30 minutes in a high pressure bed, how much time would that equate to actually tanning in the sun?

How about a stand up (12 minute) tanning session? How much is that equal to time spent in the sun?

Too much!
The American Academy of Dermatology states the average 15-30 minute visit is equivalent to an entire day at the beach.

You can say about a 8 hours on a bright sunshine day. Thats about as much UV as your getting in a tanning salon (Tanning is something I do with hides and leather BTW) The UV you get is not like the uv dosage mostly associated with sun UVR (which is composed of three types of UVR: UVA, UVB and UVC) However ANY UV in high enough doses will cause damage and can lead to cancers, wrinkles and a few other not so nice injuries to the skin.

UVB is stronger than UVA, UVB is known as being the one that causes cancer, but UVA can cause cancer too, in high enough doses.

Figuring that you get 100 times more UVA than UVB on a bright clear day, you are mostly likely getting several times more UVA in the tanning bed over the course of a few minutes than you would get laying about outside all day long.

UV is good for us. (UV) rays from sunlight trigger vitamin D synthesis in the skin, better than drinking Milk For that Vitamin. So a little is good. So we need some. What you get at a tanning salon (Tanning is still what I call curing a hide) is a bit more than you really need to be healthy.

Next time you are tanning, repeat these pretty words:

Carcinoma

Melanoma

Cancer

Thanks!

Well gee, re-reading my post I see I was a bit rude. I guess I shouldn't have added the cancers to that list. Sorry if I offended in any manner here.

Personally I mayn't appreciate somebody putting it that way to me.

So please let me clarify what I meant.

Skin cancers are a growing concern in our society, more and more people are getting skin cancers, moles and premature aging simply because we no longer bundle up, wearing excessive clothing out of some myth-guided sense of purity.

I am all for that healthy look in a person, however the downside is a higher risk of skin cancers and wrinkles.

I have had a few suspicious moles removed and each time a new one appears I worry about my wreckless shirtless youth when I was a pretty boy showing off a healthy body. Today I know the risks, I understand that the price of a "healthy" tan is aging and a higher probability of skin blemishes and cancers. I think that a bit more awareness of the health risks needs to be applied against the Magazine models who show off that bronzed look with a 6 pack or "perfect 10" body.

I really would hate to learn that Clarebear got a cancerous mole because we thought that a tanning salon was safer than suntan due to some erroneous data that only the UVB is harmful and the type of UV (UVA) you get at a salon is not.

David

Thanks David.

That was really nice of you to clare-ify that.

I know you had good intentions when you posted. You always do.