Memorial Day signals the start of summer break for many kids in Arizona as well as triple digit temperatures. Many people are preparing for upcoming outdoor activities with friends and family. While enjoying the holiday grilling or relaxing by the pool, it is important to remember safety tips to protect yourself from the Arizona heat and sun. Despite heat-related illnesses being [...]
Practicing good sun safety is important at any age, but it is especially important for children since much of a person's lifetime exposure to the sun occurs before age 18. Arizona residents are at risk for developing skin cancer because our sunny state has areas of high environmental exposure and limited protection. It's hard to [...]
The winning poster from 2015 While the beautiful Arizona weather and landscape provides us with opportunities for outdoor fun year round, we sometimes overlook the importance of exercising sun safe practices. To help raise awareness of the importance of sun safety, our SunWise Program is launching the 14th Annual Poster Contest for children from pre-K [...]
While many parts of the country are still in the throes of extreme winter weather, here in Arizona, we're seeing warmer temperatures and beautiful weather. This is the time of year Arizonans are outside getting active. It's a great time to go for bike rides, take walks around the neighborhood, get the kids and dogs out [...]
Skin cancer is now the most common cancer in the U.S. but is preventable by using good judgment. Thirteen new studies confirm what most of us have suspected, that protecting your skin from damaging UV rays with clothing, sunscreen, hats, sunglasses and shade, decreases sunburns, tanning and the formation of moles—all factors in developing a [...]
National Recreational Water Illness and Injury Prevention Week is coming up next week. Healthy swimming depends on paying attention to basic health, hygiene, sun-safety, and what swimmers bring into the pool (and what they don’t). For starters, remind your kids to take a sunscreen, hydration, and bathroom break every hour when swimming. You might also want to start [...]
It is hard to believe we’re in the 3rd year of our successful Empower Program. As a refresher for those of you that aren’t familiar with Empower, it’s a program that focuses on increasing healthy eating and active living, along with helping to provide smoke-free environments, in licensed child care facilities… reaching over 200,000 children [...]
Aksel Laudon, a 6th-grade student at Kyrene Centennial Middle School in Phoenix, is this year’s “Be SunWise and Play Sun Smart” poster-drawing contest winner. Aksel’s drawing was selected by the Arizona Diamondbacks from more than 7,000 student poster entries. Aksel and his teacher Jeffrey Garrett, and their families will be celebrated at the June 5 DBacks game in a pre-game award ceremony on [...]
School is out & the UV index will be over 10 for the next couple of months, meaning that it’s sun safety season. Since the majority of a person’s lifetime exposure to the sun occurs by the age of 18, it’s crucial to protect and educate parents and children about the simple steps to take [...]
