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A skin cancer expert is calling for sunscreen to be made cheaper - either by removing GST or offering it on prescription - to reduce New Zealand's sky-high melanoma rate.
University of Otago skin cancer prevention researcher Dr Bronwen McNoe told Midday Report's Charlotte Cook that sunscreen was significantly more expensive in New Zealand than in Australia.
The two countries shared the world's highest melanoma rate, and New Zealand had the unenviable record of the world's highest death rate from skin cancer.
McNoe said she supported any initiative that reduced the cost of sunscreen for consumers, including the current petition demanding the removal of GST.
Sunscreen manufacturers were private companies so their prices couldn't be controlled.
"So you either have to remove GST on sunscreen or you have to subsidise it. There's only really two options," she said.
As for the reason sunscreen was so much more expensive here than in Australia, a large part of that came down to sunscreen being GST-exempt across the Tasman.
There were also market-related factors, such as competition, market size and manufacturer's choice.
Another option was to expand prescription-based subsidies, McNoe said.
"What happens at the moment with Pharmac is they will they do subsidised sunscreen for people with severe photosensitivity conditions like albinism, for example. So they could maybe extend that to low-income families, outdoor workers, people with family history of melanoma."
Revenue Minister Simon Watts has previously said allowing GST to be removed from one item would lead to calls for all sorts of other, equally deserving items to be exempted - the proverbial slippery slope.
McNoe said, however, that lifting the tax from sunscreen made sound economic sense in the long run.
"Can we continue to pay the $330 million it's currently costing to treat skin cancer in New Zealand, for a disease that is largely preventable? I don't think we can, and we have to, therefore, focus on prevention. And sunscreen is one of the most popular measures that people use to protect themselves from UV, and that will save taxpayers an awful lot of money in the long term."
McNoe said there were a number of reasons for New Zealand's high skin cancer rate.
"Our UV levels are quite high, and we have a very outdoor lifestyle. We enjoy being outdoors in the sun. We've typically had quite poor sun protection habits. A lot of our population also has fair skin, and so we're at risk of developing skin cancer."
About 90 percent of skin cancers in New Zealand were preventable, she said.
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