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 Tanning beds are known to increase risk for skin cancers, including
deadly melanoma, but there is little information about how common
they are in gyms, the study authors write in JAMA Network Open.
Tanning beds have been categorized as a group-1 carcinogen, the same
level as tobacco and plutonium, said lead study author Sherry Pagoto,
a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of
Connecticut in Storrs.
"Consumers look to gyms to help them develop a healthy lifestyle,"
Pagoto told Reuters Health in an email. By offering tanning beds,
gyms are essentially putting a "health halo" on the devices, she
said.
Previous research showing a link between physical activity and
melanoma risks got Pagoto and her colleagues thinking about the
implications of gyms marketing tanning beds to physically active
people.
To investigate, they identified three of the six largest national
gym chains - Planet Fitness, Anytime Fitness and Gold's Gym - and
contacted locations in all five U.S. regions.
"We phoned 1,927 gyms from these chains across 33 states to find out
if they offered tanning beds. We found 78% of them had the
facility," Pagoto said.
In all, the authors found 4,660 tanning beds at 1,347 gyms.
"That is a lot of tanning beds! This is surprising because our sense
was the tanning industry was on the decline, but it appears it has
just moved into novel environments, with gyms being the most
common," Pagoto said.
This study highlights a lesser-known aspect of the Affordable Care
Act's indoor tanning excise tax, dermatologist Dr. Sara Hogan told
Reuters Health.
"In the 10 years since the act was passed, thousands of indoor
tanning bed salons across the country closed, decreasing access to
indoor tanning and its harmful sequela," said Hogan, of the
University of California, Los Angeles and the David Geffen School of
Medicine, who was not part of the study.
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However, the indoor tanning tax is not applied if it is offered
through a qualified physical fitness facility.
"Such facilities are exempt from the tax as long as their main focus
is promoting exercise and physical fitness, indoor tanning is an
insubstantial part of the business, members are not charged per
tanning visit, and the service is not exclusively advertised," she
explained.
While the study looked at only three gym chains in 33 states and the
District of Columbia, Hogan said the findings were troubling because
the majority of gyms surveyed housed tanning beds.
"This access to indoor tanning is broader than the medical and
public health community may think."
The authors acknowledge that their focus on just three chains is a
limitation of the study. Even so, their results suggest that current
legislation may not be sufficient to regulate tanning services, they
conclude.
The good news, Pagoto said, is that some gym chains do not include
tanning beds in their business model, giving consumers a choice.
"It would be outrageous if gyms installed cigarette machines. It is
just as outrageous that they have tanning beds," she added.
SOURCE: https://bit.ly/36fTRGL JAMA Network Open, online December
20, 2019.
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