Australia has one of the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. This makes protection from the sun very important for everyone and we all have a part to play to assure the protection of ourselves and those in our care.
From a very early age children are taught about why sun safety is important and to take action to protect themselves. This teaching is provided by Schools, pre-schools, out of hours care providers and parents. The repeated messaging is intended to ingrain sun safe behaviour for our children.
Within Scouts NSW, our Leaders, who were themselves once children, have received the same messaging and are therefore expected to behave in a sun safe manner.
Scouts NSW has not pre-scribed a sun safe policy but this does not excuse us to ignore the dangers of sun exposure. Indeed, the risks associated with exposure to the sun must be taken into account and appropriately managed when planning and delivering activities in the outdoors.
There are many resources available to Scouts NSW from where we can take a lead, including:
Rather than reproduce the excellent work of these organisations it is recommended that Leaders who will be undertaking activities in the great outdoors refer to these sites, as appropriate, when developing their programs and activity risk assessments.
If you have specific learnings that might be useful to share with other members, please let us know [email protected] and we can integrate them, as appropriate, to the Scouts NSW website.
