Scary truth about Victorian teens’ sun exposure as youngsters make up chunk of burn-related hospitalisations

Victorian teens are shunning sun smart practices in alarming numbers with adolescents making up a third of sunburn-related hospitalisations.

Sunsmart twins Alex and Georgie Muir, 16, protect themselves from the sun Picture: Mark Stewart

Victorian teens are becoming sunburnt rather than sun smart due to a lack of awareness about the sun’s dangers, new data shows.

Last summer, teenagers accounted for one third of the 177 people brought to emergency for treatment for sunburn.

Heather Walker, the head of SunSmart – an initiative of the Cancer Council – wants more to be done to stop students from getting burnt.

“The high number of teens getting burnt badly enough to require hospital treatment shows how important it is to cover up when the UV is 3 and above. This message is getting lost somewhere which is a real worry,” she said.

“Schools play a big role in influencing attitudes to sun protection. The absence of a UV policy including a mandate for hat wearing sends a message to students that sun protection is not essential which couldn’t be further from the truth,” she said.

“UV exposure is just as dangerous for students at secondary school as it is for children during the early years,” Ms Walker said.

Some high schools do have sun protection policies but they often do not include blanket hat-wearing rules.

More than 90 per cent of primary schools are signed up to the SunSmart program, but the number of secondary schools is much lower.

Ms Walker said that while employers had a legal obligation to protect outdoor workers from harmful overexposure to UV rays, teenagers did not have the same protection.

“Sun protection is a shared responsibility between schools, parents and students. We appreciate schools have a lot to contend with, however UV is a health and safety risk and comes under a school’s duty of care,” she said.

Her comments come as melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancers account for the largest number of cancers diagnosed in Australia each year. In 2019, over 2,800 Victorians were diagnosed with melanoma, with 270 losing their lives. For Victorians aged 15-29, melanoma is currently the third most commonly diagnosed cancer.

Ms Walker said skin cancer prevention needed to be maintained throughout life.

“We need to remind young people that what they do today in terms of UV exposure can have a significant impact on their risk of skin cancer down the track – and it may be sooner than they think,” she said.