‘No healthy tan’: Skin cancer rates high in New England

New England has some of the highest rates of skin cancer in the country, with areas on the Cape seeing double the national average, according to a new report from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.

“It’s somewhat surprising,” said Dr. Bruce Nash, chief physician executive at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts. “The most important thing to recognize is there is no healthy suntan.”

Blue Cross’ Health of America report, released yesterday, found that Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont and Massachusetts all have rates of diagnosed skin cancer above the 4.3 percent national average.

Massachusetts ranks sixth in the nation, with 5 percent of the population being diagnosed, while the Cape’s Barnstable-Yarmouth area has an 8.6 percent rate.

The reasons behind New England’s high incidence are hard to pinpoint, Nash said, but two factors could be the number of people with light skin and higher detection rates.

Skin cancer is the most common cancer in the United States, with nearly 9,500 new cases each day, according to the American Academy of Dermatology.

Blue Cross estimates that about 9 million privately insured people in the U.S. have skin cancer.

Nash added that New England’s more mild summers could actually contribute to the problem.

“If you’re someplace like Arizona where it’s so intensely hot, you’re not even out in the summertime,” Nash said.

Another factor could be the large beachgoing population among those in New England states, said Dr. Clarissa Yang, chief of Dermatology at Tufts Medical Center.

“On the East Coast there tend to be a lot of vacationers that go south, and there are lots of beaches on the East Coast as well,” Yang said.

For people looking forward to enjoying the summer weather, Yang recommends staying covered up and getting frequent dermatology checks.

Nash also said clothing is the best form of protection, but if sunscreen is used instead, it should be at least a shot glass-sized amount applied every two hours.

The risk of melanoma — the deadliest form of skin cancer — is one in 40 for Caucasians, one in 200 for Hispanics and one in 1,000 for African-Americans