Legislation banning artificial tanning services for people under 18 comes into effect on Monday in Quebec.
Bill 74, which was passed last June, also bans advertising and promoting artificial tanning among minors.
According to the World Health Organization, exposure of children to UV from either the sun or tanning beds raises their risk of developing melanoma—the deadliest kind of skin cancer—later in life.
The Canadian Cancer Society (CCS) says that tanning bed rays are 5 to 15 times stronger than the midday sun. According to the organization, skin cancer is the most common cancer in Quebec.
The CCS says Quebec’s legislation is more thorough than that of the other two provinces with similar legislation, Nova Scotia and British Columbia.
B.C.’s ban on the use of tanning beds by minors came into effect last October. Ontario is also currently working on a similar legislation.
On the federal level, Manitoba MP James Bezan tabled a private member’s bill for a second time in 2011 proposing a ban on the use of artificial tanning equipment for people under 18.
Tanning salons are banned in Brazil—the first country to do so—and will be banned in the state of New South Wales, Australia (which includes Sydney), in 2014.
South of the border, California has enacted legislation to ban minors from using tanning beds, and a number of other states are contemplating similar legislation.
