More Americans are getting skin cancer than ever before! Why is this so? People are still not protecting themselves adequately from harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays. People today spend more time in the sun! Shorter working hours, earlier retirement, a longer life span, lighter clothes, a waterside lifestyle and more sport and leisure pursuits all put people in the sun more often than ever. UV damage is cumulative! There's no doubt that skin cancer 'catches up with you.' The longer one lives, the more irreversible damage one suffers from the sun's UV rays.

The fastest growing cancer in the United States is skin cancer and people will expose themselves to 80% of the sun by the age of 18. Dermatologists are alarmed by an epidemic of skin cancer and children between the ages of 2-14 are particularly vulnerable.

In June 2003, the American Government officially listed ultraviolet radiation as a human carcinogen along side tobacco.