Children's
sun products| Sun protection advice gallery |  | | | | |
A major retailer is to introduce
labelling on children聮s sun products following an Inside Out investigation
which found a dangerous loophole in the law.
We tested a range of children聮s
parasols and beach shelters and found many offered worryingly low levels of UV
protection. These facts are largely unbeknown to parents because, unlike
sun cream, they don聮t have to be labelled.
After being confronted
with our findings, Argos agreed to introduce a new baby parasol with a marked
UPF of 40+ and put clear UPF labels on all other sun products.
Mothercare
and Woolworths insisted their parasols were not designed for sun protection and
are to continue selling them without labels. Read
the full report on sun products
Checking protection levelsAny
parent would be forgiven for believing their child is safe from dangerous UV rays
when sitting in the shade of a parasol or beach shelter.
But our tests,
conducted by the Health Protection Agency, found some beach shelters had a UPF
rating 聳 like SPF but for fabric 聳 as low as seven.
 | | Sam
Smith tests out the protection factor of parasols |
The highest
protection was provided by a stripy blue and yellow shelter from a Paignton beach
shop 聳 but only half of it.
The blue parts had a UPF of 30, but the
yellow bits only 14.
And a test of five different parasols revealed an
average UPF of just 15.
A child would still need clothing and sun block
to protect them from burning, which greatly increases the risk of developing skin
cancer.
Trading Standards believe this needs to be made much clearer to
parents through labelling that states exactly how much protection all sun products
offer.
It is planning to lobby the Government and retailers to introduce
such a system.
Until then it is up to parents to be careful what they buy
and keep applying the sun cream聳 even when their child聮s in the shade. Retailers
response
In response to the Inside Out investigation, Argos
says: "Argos takes the safety of all its customers extremely
seriously... we are already looking to develop additional sun specific products
for future catalogues and will clearly mark the relevant products with the UPF
rating."
Mothercare also responded as follows:
"Our
pushchair parasols are not designed to be sun safety or sun protection products.
"We clearly state in the user guide that parents should provide all
the usual sun protection methods including protective clothing and sun block on
exposed skin."
Woolworths say that their parasol is merely a sunshade:
"The Woolworths Ladybird Parasol is designed as a sunshade only and is
not labelled as providing sun protection.
"However we are currently
in talks with suppliers about stocking parasols which are designed to offer greater
sun protection." Links relating to this story:The 大象传媒 is not responsible
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Pioneers
Corps  | | Marching
for victory - the Pioneer Corps. Courtesy of Fritz Lustig. |
Inside
Out meets four very special war veterans as they return to Ilfracombe to relive
old memories.
Willy Field, Geoffrey Perry, Fritz Lustig and Harry Rossney
were part of a group of soldiers whose part in the Second World War remains largely
unrecognised 聳 because they came from enemy countries.
They were some
of the Jews and other 聭undesirables聮 that were allowed to flee Germany
and Austria before war broke out. Escape to England
Many parents scrambled to get their children abroad as anti-Semitism persecution
intensified.
Thousands were given refuge in Britain. When war broke
out, they were recruited to the British Army to serve in the Pioneer Corps 聳
popularly know as "The King聮s own Enemy Aliens". Three thousand
passed through training in Ilfracombe at the start of their lives as British soldiers.
Some
of central Europe聮s most intellectual elite could be found in its ranks,
but their typical remit of building roads and camps and digging trenches made
them essentially army navvies.
Many, including Willy and his friends, then
went on to serve in regular fighting units of the army.
Their German background
meant they were very useful soldiers. Special
missions
Many were recruited by the Special Operations Executive,
which encouraged and facilitated espionage and sabotage behind enemy lines.
They
took on British identities in case they were ever captured. "It
was a wonderful feeling. This is what I had always wanted to do... It was the
most exciting part of my life. I did something. I could give something back to
the country which saved me." | Willy
Field |
If they kept their German or Austrian names,
they could be tried for treachery and shot, but if they were thought to be British
they would be awarded POW status.
After the war, most kept their new identities
and stayed in the country which had given them a safe home.
Willy and many
like him had no regrets about fighting their fellow countrymen. They felt
they had given back something to the country which had saved them.
Links
relating to this story:The 大象传媒 is not responsible for
the content of external websites |
Longitude | | John
Harrison devised a time keeper to help navigation. Courtesy of the Science Museum. |
Inside
Out reveals how the second worst shipping disaster in Royal Naval history happened
right off the coast of the Isles of Scilly and kick-started a revolution in seafaring.
On
the stormy 21st October 1707, Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell, in command of a
squadron of 21 British Men o' War approached the soundings of the Isles of Scilly.
On his voyage from the Mediterranean, currents and foul weather had taken
him off course and he was hopelessly lost.
He thought the British Channel
'was open and clear before him', but he was miles out in his reckoning.
The
squadron became entangled on the treacherous rocks off the Isles of Scilly.
Four
ships were lost and out of the 1,500 men on board, only 24 survived.
Longitude
This
disaster was particularly horrific, but shipwrecks were not at all uncommon at
the time, because sailors had no way of accurately charting their position at
sea.
In geography, there is an imaginary grid around the world, thought
up by Greek scholar Ptolemy some 2,200 years ago, that can be used to calculate
the exact location of places.
 | | Longitude
- time to find a solution to an age old problem |
Latitude lines
go across the map, measured in degrees and numbered from 0掳 to 90掳 north
and south, with the equator as the starting point.
Longitude lines run
from top to bottom, measured in 180掳 east and west with the Greenwich meridian
at zero.
Throughout history, latitude was always relatively easy to calculate
from the position of the stars.
But there was no accurate way of calculating
longitude, which is what led Admiral Shovell and many others like him to untimely
deaths.
Sailors knew that the earth turned 360掳 every day, or 15掳
every hour.
So if you travelled 15掳 eastward, the local time moves
ahead one hour and similarly, travelling west, the local time moves back one hour.
So
if it was noon where you were and it was nine am in Greenwich, where you started,
you would have travelled west for three hours and be at longitude 45掳.
Time
and place
The problem was, back in the 17th Century there was
no way of accurately telling the time at sea.
There weren聮t any clocks
that could withstand the motion of a ship and the changes in humidity and temperature
at sea.
 | | Measuring
time - Harrison's clock was designed to help navigation |
Even
some of the best clocks of the early 18th Century could lose as much as 10 minutes
per day, which translated into 150 miles or more.
The death of so many
men off Scilly sparked a competition for the 'discovery of longitude'
In
1714, the British Government offered, by Act of Parliament, 拢20,000 for
a solution 聳 equivalent to more than 拢2.5 million today - which could
provide longitude to within half-a-degree (two minutes of time).
A Board
of Longitude was set up to administer and judge the prize.
Many weird and
wonderful suggestions were received, alongside attempts by some of the best brains
in the land, including Edmund Halley and Isaac Newton.
In the end the problem
was solved by a humble clockmaker from up north, after more than 40 years working
on the design.
Testing time
John Harrison聮s chronometer,
which resembled a pocket watch, could withstand all weather conditions to keep
accurate time.
The Board of Longitude was at first not convinced and dismissed
it as a fluke, but was eventually forced to award Harrison the 拢20,000 following
support for his cause from King George III and an Act of Parliament.
Harrison聮s
chronometer revolutionised global trade and was used by Captain Cook on his second
and third voyages, which accurately charted many areas and recording several islands
and coastlines on European maps for the first time.
Links relating
to this story:The 大象传媒 is not
responsible for the content of external websites |
听听Inside
Out - South West: Monday October 16, 2006