Skin Cancer On The Rise In Ireland & How To Protect Yourself!

With summer 2016 kicking off last weekend, we wanted to write this article to highlight the importance of protecting ourselves from the harmful rays. Some of us are guilty of using sun beds in the past and burning our skin while on holidays, myself included. Some of these figures about skin cancer may make you re think how you protect yourself from the harmful effects of UV Rays.

Skin cancer is on the rise here in Ireland, in fact skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in Ireland today with over 8,000 new cases diagnosed each year. A finding on IrishHealth.com claims that 700 Irish people are newly diagnosed with melanoma – the most deadly form of skin cancer – every year and two people die from the disease every week! How scary is that! We all worry about breast cancer and ovarian cancer but why dont we worry about skin cancer?

I suppose it all comes down to us Irish feeling that because we dont live in a ‘hot’ country, we have nothing to be worried about – Ah we’ve no sun here, so I’m grand’. When in actual fact it’s quite the opposite. We have extremely harmful rays beaming down on us daily, even if it’s not sunny and more people are being diagnosed with different forms and stages of skin cancer as it is hugely on the rise. The easiest way to protect yourself is to cover up. Another big factor is sunbeds – they are incredibly dangerous and drastically increase the chances of developing skin cancer so they are best avoided.

Some people think about sun protection only when they spend a day at the beach. But sun exposure adds up day after day, and it happens every time you are in the sun.

Simply staying in the shade is one of the best ways to limit your UV exposure. If you are going to be in the sun..

Slip on a shirt
Wear suncreen
Put on a hat
Wear sunglasses

As part of Skin Cancer Awareness Month at McGreals Pharmacy we are giving away a free car sun shades in store with every child product purchased to do our bit to help protect children from the harmful rays while travelling. For your nearest store location click here