Hodgdon High School students win $500 in no-tanning contest

    HODGDON — Students from Hodgdon High School entered the Melanoma Foundation of New England’s “Your Skin Is In” no tanning contest and chose their health over a tan during this year’s prom season.
    Seventy five percent of the junior class signed a pledge asking them to make a commitment to avoid tanning prior to their prom. That included no visits to tanning beds, something over two million teens in the United States do annually.
    The contest, open to New England high schools, asked students to sign a pledge to not tan prior to their prom.  Schools that got at least seventy percent of their prom class to sign the pledge were entered into a raffle with a chance to win $1,000 or $500 state prizes and tickets to Six Flags New England. Over 5,500 students across New England signed the pledge Hodgdon High School was selected as one of the $500 winners.
    According to Dr. Rhoda Alani, Herbert Mescon Professor and Chair of Dermatology at Boston University School of Medicine, many teens don’t worry about the risks of indoor tanning since they think that skin cancer is a disease of older people. “Let’s just get the facts out: Close to 2.5 million teens tan indoors in the US every year, increasing their risk of developing melanoma by 75 percent. Indoor tanners are also 2.5 times more likely to develop squamous cell carcinoma, and 1.5 times more likely to develop basal cell carcinoma.” Dr. Alani is a member of the Melanoma Foundation of New England’s Medical Advisory Board.
    “We congratulate Hodgdon High School students and commend their efforts to help create awareness about the dangers of tanning and the associated risks of melanoma,” said Deb Girard, Executive Director of the Melanoma Foundation of New England. “The World Health Organization is very specific about the dangers of tanning beds for young people. And their position is very clear: ‘No one under the age of 18 should use a tanning bed.’ And there is plenty of research that shows that tanning can lead to melanoma. Melanoma rates have been skyrocketing among women aged 18 to 25 over the past five years.”