British Columbia\u2019s Capital Region District \u2014 an area of about 370,000 people in and around Victoria on Vancouver Island \u2014 surprisingly reneged on its promise to form a working group with the tanning community and instead passed a bylaw Wednesday prohibiting anyone under 18 from tanning in a tanning facility.<\/p>\n
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The indoor tanning community convinced CRD to December to make good on its earlier directive \u2014 an order that actually dates back to 2005 \u2014 to engage a working group with the Vancouver Island Health Authority to discuss ways to improve VIHA\u2019s proposed bylaw \u2014 which while prohibiting teens from tanning actually did less to regulate training and salon protocol than what JCTA has asked for.<\/p>\n
JCTA, for 18 months, has told any government in Canada it would support a set of basic protocol regulations and would proactively work with provinces to enact standards. VIHA told the CRD board at the meeting Wednesday and in editorials in the Victoria Times Columnist that the industry opposed regulation \u2014 a blatant misrepresentation.<\/p>\n
The CRD board in December \u2014 upon hearing that other than one preliminary meeting VIHA never met with the industry as directed, and that the tanning community had not been involved in the process \u2014 ordered the Jan. 12 meeting to take place so the industry could be heard.<\/p>\n
But the meeting turned out to be lip service, as CRD Chairman Geoff Young opened the meeting by directing board members not to ask questions during a lengthy public hearing. \u201cI would ask that we have no questions of the speakers by the board members,\u201d Young said \u2014 stifling any question and answer. That format \u2014 combined with hours of hyperbolic 5-minute presentations from about three dozen high school students, who had worked with the Canadian Cancer Society and VIHA Medical Officer Dr. Richard Stanwyk \u2014 effectively drowned out the 12 five-minute presentations from tanning community speakers and experts who testified in support of the tanning community\u2019s position.<\/p>\n
Some of the teens showed videos of melanoma patients \u2014 people who had never even tanned in tanning equipment. One video showed high school students repeating a written script asking for CRD to ban tanning \u2014 a video that included cheerleading and dancing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was never about the science, and it was never about engaging in meaningful discussion to improve CRD\u2019s bylaw,\u201d JCTA Executive Director Steve Gilroy said. \u201cWe\u2019re disappointed that CRD did not allow a format of meaningful discussion or direct this to a working group which could have improved the bylaw.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many speakers in support of the bylaw mis-stated facts that could not be challenged in the format without discussion.<\/p>\n
The bylaw must now be signed by the British Columbia Minister of Healthy Living and Sports to take effect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
British Columbia\u2019s Capital Region District \u2014 an area of about 370,000 people in and around Victoria on Vancouver Island \u2014 surprisingly reneged on its promise to form a working group with the tanning community and instead passed a bylaw Wednesday prohibiting anyone under 18 from tanning in a tanning facility. The indoor tanning community convinced […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n