| With the Met Office predicting a summer
heatwave, Macmillan Cancer Relief this week{{U}} (1) {{/U}}its customary
warning about the sun's ultravioiet rays:{{U}} (2) {{/U}}, it says, for
the huge rise in skin cancers affecting 70,000 people a year.{{U}} (3)
{{/U}}a hat and long-sleeved shirt, it advises, keep in the{{U}} (4)
{{/U}}in the middle of the day, and slap{{U}} (5) {{/U}}suncream
with a protection factor of 15 or above. We all know it{{U}} (6) {{/U}}; it's the message that's been drummed into us for the past 20 years. Too much sun{{U}} (7) {{/U}}. But now there's a fly in the suntan lotion, complicating the message's clarity. It comes{{U}} (8) {{/U}}a thin, quietly-spoken and officially retired Nasa scientist, Professor William Grant, who says that sun doesn't kill; in {act, it does us the world of{{U}} (9) {{/U}}. What's killing us, he says, is our{{U}} (10) {{/U}}with protecting ourselves from skin cancer. Grant is trying to turn the scientific world{{U}} (11) {{/U}}down. Talking to me on a trip to Britain this week, he{{U}} (12) {{/U}}his startling--and at first appearance off-the-wall new calculation that{{U}} (13) {{/U}}excessive exposure to the sun is costing 1,600 deaths a year in the UK from melanoma skin cancers,{{U}} (14) {{/U}}exposure to the sun is the cause of 25,000 deaths a year from cancer generally. In other words, one sixth of all cancer deaths could be prevented{{U}} (15) {{/U}}we sunned ourselves a little more; in comparison, the melanoma{{U}} (16) {{/U}}is insignificant. The reason is vitamin D. Grant, the director of the Sunlight, Nutrition and Health Research Centre (SUNARC) he{{U}} (17) {{/U}}in California a year ago, says that he and other scientists have{{U}} (18) {{/U}}vitamin D deficiency as a key cause{{U}} (19) {{/U}}17 different types of cancer including melanoma, osteoporosis, diabetes, multiple sclerosis and other neurological{{U}} (20) {{/U}}. |