1 in 5 white women who use indoor tanning are addicted to it

Indoor tanning is a beauty staple for many Americans, with 35% of Americans having visited a tanning salon at least once in their lifetimes. The tanning bed market is expected to grow steadily into 2018, but the practice is more than a skin-deep beauty routine, researchers say: it’s a dangerous addiction with potentially lethal consequences.

More than one-fifth of non-Hispanic white women who tan are addicted to the high-dose ultraviolet radiation from tanning beds, a new study published on Thursday found. It was published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. Researchers surveyed almost 400 women who had gone tanning indoors in the past 12 months and found 22.6% screened positive for dependence on the practice. This addiction was strongly associated with beliefs around physical appearance and depressive symptoms, the study showed.

“People know it’s bad, but they still do it,” said Darrell S Rigel, Clinical Professor of Dermatology New York University Medical School. “One thing that is sneaky and insidious about indoor tanning is that the process of tanning releases endorphins so you feel good when you’re doing it.”

But after the rush ends, tanners can show signs of depression. This means treatment for addiction, including antidepressants, could be effective in reducing the prevalence of tanning among young women—in addition to public health campaigns.

“We tested interventions that were about risk communication, but for this population with tanning dependence, the thing that stands out to us was not only the association between attitudes and beliefs, but their depressive symptoms,” said Darren Mays, Ph.D., assistant professor of oncology at Georgetown University School of Medicine and author on the study, which he called “troubling.”

Even just one exposure to indoor tanning is associated with an approximately 20% increase in the likelihood of developing melanoma, the most deadly form of skin cancer, the study notes. Though today more people than ever know indoor tanning is dangerous, behaviors have yet to change, said Rigel.

He added that because the aesthetic damage incurred by tanning doesn’t fully reveal itself until 10 to 20 years after it’s done, people don’t realize how much regular tanning affects them until they start developing dark freckles, skin damage, and even cancer years later. Before the rise in tanning beds, Rigel said he would rarely see women under the age of 30 with skin cancer—but now it’s common for him to see women in their 20s with melanoma, often in areas natural sun doesn’t reach, like the breasts and groin. The tanning industry maintains that tanning is not comparable to drug addiction.

“It is imprudent to characterize our natural and intended attraction to sunlight as addictive,” Joseph Levy, Director of Scientific Affairs American Suntanning Association, told MarketWatch. “UV exposure is a natural attraction, and humans get less regular sunlight today than at any point in human history.”

Indoor tanning costs the U.S. $343 million a year in medical costs, according to a study published this year by the Journal of Cancer Policy. To address the problem, Rigel suggested a national public education campaign and stronger laws to protect minors from tanning.

“I always say, I would love to put myself out of business, but unfortunately I still am in business because of these attitudes and businesses,” he said.