Abstract

Skin cancer is the most common cancer in humans and Australia (particularly in Queensland) has the highest incidence globally. Sunlight is a known skin carcinogen and reflects off water, exacerbating the risk of sunburn. In 1988, the “SunSmart Program” was developed to promote sun-protection to Australian children. Within a decade, it evolved to include a voluntary national accreditation program for schools, known as the SunSmart Schools (SSS) Program. Additionally, in 2008, it became compulsory for primary schoolchildren attending Queensland government-funded schools to wear a shirt during all water-based activities, except when competing. We observed the proportion of student spectators from 41 Townsville (latitude 19.3°S) primary schools (65.9% SSS) wearing hats at inter-school swimming carnivals in 2009–2011 and 2015 and the proportion wearing a shirt. Overall, a median of 30.7% student spectators from each school wore a hat [max 46.2% (2009); min 18% (2015)] and 77.3% wore a shirt [max 95.8% (2009); min 74.5% (2015)], suggesting that hats are under-utilized. Students from non-government (private) schools were twice as likely as students from government schools to wear a hat (41 vs. 18.2% p = 0.003). Neither the hat nor the shirt-wearing behaviors of student spectators were significantly influenced by their school’s size (number of students), educational advantage, sun-protection policy score, or SunSmart status, indicating that other socioeconomic factors, not assessed here, may have influenced the results. Our findings suggest that the mandatory swim-shirt policy introduced in 2008 was very effective, especially initially. However, monitoring and feedback of results to schools may be needed to maintain high levels of compliance in the longer-term. Schoolchildren attending swimming carnivals should not rely on sunscreen or shade alone to protect against direct and reflected-sunlight, and need prompting to put a hat and shirt back on immediately after a race. This responsibility could be delegated to either a parent or a student prefect, if teachers are too busy to encourage and monitor sun-safety compliance among the students in their care.

Highlights

  • Australia is an island nation; ~86% of Australians live within 50 km of the coast [1]

  • The Australian sun-loving culture paired with genetically susceptible Caucasian ancestry has resulted in Australia having among the highest rates of cutaneous melanoma (CM) and epithelial skin cancer in the world [4, 5]

  • Students from non-government schools were twice as likely to be seen wearing a hat as government primary school students (41.0 vs. 18.2%; p = 0.003)

Read more

Summary

Introduction

Australia is an island nation; ~86% of Australians live within 50 km of the coast [1]. Australians love the beach, fishing, swimming, surfing, playing sport, and being in the “great outdoors.”. Generations of Australians were brought up playing outside; wore little sun-protection; and believed a tan signified good health [2, 3]. The Australian sun-loving culture paired with genetically susceptible Caucasian ancestry has resulted in Australia having among the highest rates of cutaneous melanoma (CM) and epithelial skin cancer in the world [4, 5]. Solar ultraviolet radiation (UVR) is a known skin carcinogen and over-exposure, during the childhood years, leads to the proliferation of melanocytic nevi (MN) [6,7,8,9,10], which are a risk factor for CM development [9, 11,12,13]. Keratinocyte carcinomas, and CM are extremely common in the Queensland population and often develop on chronically sun-exposed areas of the face, ears, neck, and scalp [14,15,16,17]

Objectives
Methods
Results
Discussion
Conclusion
Full Text
Published version (Free)

Talk to us

Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have

Schedule a call