Manchester City Draw Ire Of Skin Cancer Charity After Banning Sunscreen In Stadium

As much of the U.K. swelters in unusually hot summer temperatures, reigning Premier League champions Manchester City have been criticized by a skin cancer charity after they told a fan that sunscreen was not permitted inside the stadium ahead of the team’s match against Bournemouth FC yesterday.

The club’s supporter services account tweeted saying: “…sun cream will not be permitted on entry into the Stadium. We advise supporters to apply this before coming and to bring a hat and water.” The fan then replied urging the club to rethink the policy, noting that the temperature would be exceeding 30°C (>86°F) during the match in bright sunshine with no shade. The policies for entering the Etihad stadium do prohibit “bottles” being brought into the venue, but it is unclear whether this is the reason for sunscreen being banned.

The charity, Melanoma U.K. called the ban “very worrying,” urging the club to re-think this policy and called for stadiums to install sunscreen dispensers, noting that this has been easily done with hand sanitizer stations during the pandemic. This has been done with some sports organizations already, including college stadiums and MLB baseball team the Philadelphia Phillies, who ran a pilot in 2017 – although it is unclear whether these are still available.

Melanoma, the most common form of skin cancer, is the 5th most common type of cancer in the U.K. with 16,700 cases per year and over 2,300 deaths, according to Cancer Research U.K.

Manchester City have been contacted for comment on this policy, but had not yet replied at the time of publishing this article.