Reducing Risk in the Sun - the Ultraviolet Index

We’re all familiar with it during the summer – on the TV weather, in the daily newspaper and at the outdoor swimming pool. It’s the colourful UV Index telling us today’s risk from the sun. The higher the level the arrow points to the greater the risk of skin damage.

For many years New Zealanders used Burn Time as a way to judge when they were at risk from too much ultraviolet radiation (UVR) from the sun. So how did the UV Index come to be developed and what effect is it having?

With harmful UVR exposure accounting for more than 90 percent of skin cancers and our extremely high rates of skin cancer, particularly melanoma, there were two questions – was there a better way to provide New Zealanders with a more effective tool for measuring the level of UVR and could that measure be linked directly to appropriate sun safety behaviours so people could lower their risk?”

Richard McKenzie of the National Institute of Weather and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) had been advocating for the Ultraviolet Index to be introduced since the early 1990s.

“The UV Index has been promoted by the World Health Organization for many years,” he says. “It’s a scientific measure of the amount of UVR in the environment. In New Zealand the scale can range from 0, up to around 14 in mid-summer.

“By contrast Burn Time was subjective and did not take into account differences in skin type, age, etc. So, a Burn Time of 15 minutes could mean some people actually got burned.”

Following research, carried out by Nicola Kime and Tony Reeder of the Social and Behavioural Research in Cancer Unit at the Dunedin School of Medicine, University of Otago, the following recommendations were made:

• • New Zealand should adopt the WHO UV Index international guidelines.
  • The UV Index should be used nationally in summer weather reports.
  • The UV Index should be supplemented with behavioural sun protection messages.
  
  

Collaboration between stakeholders proved crucial. A national UV Index Working Group was formed, which included NIWA, the Health Sponsorship Council (HSC), the Cancer Society of New Zealand and MetService.

This group decided the introduction of the UV Index to New Zealand would:

• • be nationally driven but globally based
  • require a process framework
  • be monitored and measured.
  
  

If the index looked familiar when it was introduced it was because it was based on the rural fire risk signs.

“We developed UV Index graphics based on the Rural NZ Fire signs, and then matched the levels with appropriate sun safety behaviours,” says HSC Project Manager Wendy Billingsley.

“So, for example, when the UV Index is at 10 the recommendation is ‘VERY HIGH- Seek shade. Slip, slop, slap and wrap. Reapply sunscreen regularly’.”

From October to March the UV Index is supplied free every day to all media as part of the MetService-supplied weather forecasts. All year round this information is available on the SunSmart website

So what effect is the index having? Wendy says it’s early days and comprehensive research has yet to be done.

“But the biggest success we’ve had is that the major daily newspapers and the television channels are using it, even though they don’t have to. And research shows that people understand it’s a scale – they know that the higher the level the more they have to take care.”

The next step is to explore providing real time rather than forecasted UV Index information.

To find out more

http://www.sunsmart.org.nz/