EVERY morning, Taylor Lyttle heads to a local beauty salon for a 15-minute sunbed session.
After topping up her already deep-mahogany tan, at a cost of £13, the 21 year old then scrolls TikTok to check if her skin is darker than all of her sunbed-using friends.
“If I see someone online darker than me, I get annoyed. I love how I look with a tan, it boosts my confidence and I feel more attractive,” she says.
Taylor, a hairdresser from Belfast, adds that she’s aware of the risks of sunbed use, including skin cancer, but isn’t too worried.
“I’m very healthy. I eat well, I look after myself. I’ve never had any issues since I started using sunbeds five years ago.
“I think of it as me-time – it’s relaxing and reduces my stress,” she says.
Like countless other Gen Z girls aged 13-28, Taylor spends hours scrolling posts on TikTok with hashtags like #tanned, #sunnyd and #whatmakesyouhappy, often featuring users bathed in blue UV light. “It’s a problem, but I’d rather die hot than live ugly I guess #yolo #lol #sunbed,” reads one caption.
Meanwhile, influencers on the platform claim tanning beds can do everything from boost vitamin D levels to improve your mental health.
Not only are many of these claims unproven, some are entirely false, and charities are concerned that marketing tanning as a “wellness” trend is driving Gen Z girls and women to sunbeds – risking their health, and even death, from skin cancer.
It’s big money, too, with the UK’s largest tanning chain, The Tanning Shop, growing by 40% since 2018.
‘Social media encourages us – we look at people’s tans online and it gets competitive’
Taylor has been using sunbeds since she was 16, even though it’s illegal under the age of 18.
“No one ever checked my age,” she says. “I just paid my money and went in. I guess I was self-conscious about my pale skin and I don’t have a lot of confidence.
“It’s something that helps me. My mum knew I was doing it, but she didn’t mind.”
It’s a social thing as well – we’ll often meet at the sunbed salon then have coffee or lunch afterwards.
Taylor Lyttle
She adds: “Now, I go most days, spending over £200 month to get my fix. I also use nasal tanning sprays [which contain synthetic hormones such as Melanotan II and are sprayed directly into the nostrils to stimulate the production of melanin and darken the skin], before each session, which I get for £25 from a friend.”
Last month, Trading Standards issued a warning that tanning nasal sprays could cause “nausea, vomiting, high blood pressure and even changes in mole shape and size,” and urged users to be cautious about unlicensed sprays bought online.
However, Taylor insists she’s never suffered any side effects, and plans to continue using them.
“Social media encourages us,” she says. “I don’t post photos of myself, but we all look at people’s tans and it gets competitive.
“We watch videos about how to boost your tan and most of us use tanners like nasal sprays.
“It’s a social thing as well – we’ll often meet at the sunbed salon then have coffee or lunch afterwards.”
Dr Björn Thomas, a consultant dermatologist and lead for melanoma at Guys’ and St Thomas’ Hospital, London, is seeing a rising number of young patients.
“We’re no longer surprised to see someone aged 19 or 20 with melanoma,” he says. “Often, they’ve had lots of exposure to sunbeds. It’s an increasing trend among younger generations.”
Dr Thomas said there is “minimal” evidence emerging that a small amount of UV light is good for you. “The reality is, sunbeds are not safe,” he says.
“The carcinogenic, cancer-causing effect could be significantly higher than if you are getting ambient sunlight out and about.
Melanoma is a very common cancer – it has the ability to spread and kill patients. It is a very serious diagnosis and the knock-on effect to your life could be devastating.”
Risks of sunbeds
THE promise of a constant glowing tan is too tempting for some people to deny.
But while popping to the sunbed shop may seem harmless, people who use tanning beds should be aware of the risks.
Approximately 10 per cent of the population of Northern Europe use sunbeds on a regular basis, the World Health Organization says.
Some people use them for years on end, accumulating risk of serious disease.
We are here to give you the lowdown on sunbeds and if they are safe to use.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), sunbeds are as dangerous as smoking.
Like the sun, they give out harmful UV rays that damage the DNA in your skin cells.
Over time, this may lead to malignant melanoma – the deadliest form of skin cancer – studies have shown.
According to the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), there is significant evidence to show that using tanning beds causes melanoma.
They report that sunbeds increase the risk of skin cancer by up to 20 per cent, and also state that they have no positive benefits to our health.
Cancer Research back this statistic, adding that ” there is no such thing as a safe tan from UV radiation”.
One study found that sunbeds can almost double the risk of cancer compared to never using them – with women 83 per cent more likely to develop the disease.
While some people think tanning beds are safer than sitting out in the midday sun, according to Cancer Research, the risk is still twice as high when compared to spending the same amount of time in the Mediterranean sun at lunch time.
The Sunbed Association claim there is not enough evidence to link sunbed use with melanoma, adding: “It is over-exposure and burning that will increase a risk of skin cancer, not responsible UV exposure.”
But the WHO says: “The majority of tanning parlours provide inadequate advice to their customers.
“The use of eye protection such as goggles or sunglasses should be mandatory.
“However, as sunbed users aim to have an even tan, they often decide against protecting any part of their body.”
Referring to the link with skin cancer, the world health experts add: “Sunbeds for self-tanning purposes have been available for the last two decades and due to the long latency period for skin cancer and eye damage it has been difficult so far to demonstrate any long-term health effects.
“Even though the causes of malignant melanoma are not fully understood, tumour development appears to be linked to occasional exposure to intense sunlight.
“Sunbeds subject their users to intermittent high exposures of UVA and UVB radiation – this may provide the ideal setting for the development of malignant skin cancer.
“However, the few epidemiological studies that have been carried out to date have not provided any consistent results.”
Despite the WHO’s cautious stance on the skin cancer link, it discourages the use of sunbeds, quoting an expert who said the use of tanning parlours is like “an industrial-scale radiation exposure experiment”.
Regardless of skin cancer, sunbeds don’t just have long-term health risks.
Users have reported a range of short-term symptoms including itching, dryness and redness of skin, freckling and photosensitivity.
Common outcomes in the longer term, especially in fair-skinned people, may involve blistering of the skin.
“Sagging and wrinkling of the skin are an almost certain price to be paid by frequent sunbed users”, the WHO says – not quite the outcome you hope for when going to the sunbed shop for a beautiful, youthful look.
Georgia Edwards was diagnosed with melanoma when she was just 19, after finding a bloody mole on her thigh. She’d been using sunbeds for three years.
“I was really young and loved having a tan without the faff of getting all messy using fake tan,” recalls Georgia, now 27, from Horley, Surrey.
“My friends and I would go together for 10 minutes and you’d feel like you’d gone to Spain and back. It became addictive.”
Even though she was at school when she started, like Taylor, she says she was never asked for ID.
I was called back in and there was a consultant and a Macmillan nurse – I knew it wasn’t good news and broke down.
Georgia Edwards
“I just put my card into the machine and selected how many minutes I wanted.
“I was going three or four times a week, but I could have gone twice a day if I’d wanted. No one stopped me.”
Georgia showed her GP the affected mole in March 2017, after going to the doctor for a chest infection, and was immediately referred. After a biopsy, she was diagnosed with stage two melanoma that May.
“I was called back in and there was a consultant and a Macmillan nurse – I knew it wasn’t good news and broke down.”
Georgia, who works in a rehabilitation centre for children with brain injuries, was referred to London’s Royal Marsden Hospital for treatment.
She had two surgeries to remove the cancer. Fortunately, it hadn’t spread.
“I had a wide, local incision to cut out the mole and surrounding area as it was quite deep in my skin and close to the lymph nodes,” she says.
“I have a 12cm scar on my leg and, eight years later, I’m still regularly checked as there’s a high risk of it returning.
“I was young and naive. I thought it wouldn’t happen to me. That was my mindset. Young people simply aren’t aware of the dangers, and in years to come there’s going to be a mass of people getting diagnosed.
“Influencers promoting sunbeds have no idea of the dangers, they don’t realise it could cost someone their life.”
‘I lost my sister and best friend to sunbed use’
Jessica Crowe knows only too well the the pain sunbeds can bring. Her sister Tazmyn spoke to Fabulous in 2021 after being diagnosed with skin cancer in 2014.
The mum of three died in March 2023, aged just 31, having used sunbeds up to twice a day when she was younger.
“When we were teenagers, Tazmyn would use them all the time,” recalls Jessica, 31, a healthcare assistant and mum to Poppi, 14, and Memphis-Cub, two.
“I went with her a couple of times, but I’d just burn, so I stopped going. She was the tanned one and she loved it.
“But after her diagnosis, she’d often say: ‘Why did I do it?’ She immediately stopped using them and regretted ever having gone on one.”
Five years after her diagnosis, the cancer returned to her lymph nodes – reaching stage three.
“Pregnant with her third child at the time, Tazmyn delivered her son 10 weeks prematurely in order to have further cancer treatment, almost losing him to a pulmonary haemorrhage.
Tragically, despite further surgery and medication, Tazmyn’s cancer spread, progressing to stage four, and in March 2023 she passed away, leaving her children Dillyn-Angel, 14, Saylor-Doll, 11, and Boss, five, to grow up without their mother.
Still grieving, Jessica, from Northern Ireland, says she finds social media posts advocating sunbed use and tan-boosting products distressing.
“It makes me so sad and angry. They make it sound like having a sunbed is harmless, when it’s not.
“As a family, we learned that the hardest way. Everything that Tazmyn went through began with sunbed use.
“I was devastated when we lost her. I still am. She wasn’t just my sister, but my best friend.
“My daughter would never use a sunbed, as she knows what happened to her aunt, but her friends do – some are only 13.
“They are easily influenced by TikTok and Instagram.”
This high-intensity UVA radiation can lead to genetic changes and mutations over time, which can build up and increase the risk of skin cancer.
Susanna Daniels, CEO of Melanoma Focus
The charity Melanoma Focus recently revealed that almost a third of people aged 16 and over in the UK use sunbeds, and that figure rises to 52% among 18-21 year olds.
“More worryingly, only 47% of that age group understood that sunbeds increase their risk of skin cancer – and 20% even believed it could decrease the risk.
“These figures are really concerning,” says Susanna Daniels, CEO of Melanoma Focus.
“There is a swathe of misinformation on social media. Rather than being good for your health and increasing levels of vitamin D, as some influencers claim, most sunbeds mainly emit UVA radiation – which damages the DNA in skin cells – rather than UVB, which is required for vitamin D production.
“This high-intensity UVA radiation can lead to genetic changes and mutations over time, which can build up and increase the risk of skin cancer.
In 2009, the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified UV radiation from commercial tanning beds as a type 1 carcinogen – putting it in the same category as smoking and asbestos,” explains Susanna.
“As a charity, we are very concerned about this widespread misinformation circulating on social media.
“This has been on the rise in recent years and it may be leading people to make harmful choices.”
Despite hearing stories like Tazmyn’s, Taylor says she has no plans to ditch her TikTok tan any time soon.
“I sometimes worry about the risk and I do check my moles, but I’m young and I put it to the back of my mind,” she confesses.
“People drink, smoke, vape or eat junk food. Lots of things we do are bad, but we do it anyway. For me, a tan is worth the risk.”
‘If young people aren’t making the right choices, we need to help them’
Meanwhile, Jessica has a very different message. “I’d like to see sunbeds banned like they are in other countries such as Australia, or at least some restrictions so they are not promoted online,” she says.
“When you’re young, you don’t think about the risks, but if young people aren’t making the right choices, we need to help them.”
“Skin cancer took my sister from me and robbed her children of their mother.
“My message to young women is: please stop using sunbeds, and ignore these influencers promoting them. Your life is worth more than a tan.”
- Call the Melanoma helpline on 0808 801 0777, 1-2pm and 7-9pm Monday-Friday, 7-9pm on Sundays (Melanomafocus.org).
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