By Diana DeJesus
Many women on campus are bummed about losing their summer tans, but they shouldn’t be so eager to attain them in the first place. New Jersey City University is a campus of multicultural faces, and 35 percent of the campus is made up of Hispanic students. According to the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) “more than 2 million people are diagnosed annually” with skin cancer, but the death rate among women diagnosed with melanoma is highest among those with darker skin.
Although melanoma only represents 1 percent of skin cancers, it is the deadliest one. A study to confirm the statistics, done by University of Miami, reported that melanoma is “much more deadly among black and Hispanic women than among white women.”
To be safe, the AAD warns that you should pair sunscreen with protective clothing, such as sunglasses and hats; get to shady spots when they are accessible, and check your skin for noticeable changes like growing moles, and most importantly, avoid tanning beds!
If the thought of cancer is not enough to get you to protect yourself, remember this: too much sun can destroy your skin and it causes premature aging There is no amount of concealer that can fully cover sun-damaged skin. (Even if there were, do you know how long it would take to cover your face, chest and arms with concealer? You might as well save yourselves the agony and use the sunblock.)
If you still don’t care, you should know that hydrocortisone cream can help ease discomfort of sunburn, and ibuprofen can help reduce the swelling, redness, and pain, but melanoma kills and there is no cover-up cream for death.