PERSONAL HEALTH : Feeling Sting of Sun’s Rays : Health: Increasingly wary of deadly skin cancers, Californians with dark tans are fading fast.

George Hamilton is hawking sun block cream.

That’s right. The man with a more intimate relationship with the sun than the planet Mercury is promoting tubes of goop designed, in part, to keep the rays out.

And the Bain de Soleil suntan lotion model? The one with the skin that used to shine like oiled mahogany? Today she looks almost beige.

Surfers are putting on hats, lifeguards are wearing long sleeves, and Delta Airlines is running an ad showing a bathing-suited woman sitting on a beach shading herself with a big umbrella.

Amazing what a little whiff of mortality can do.

All those uncomfortable things the dermatologists have been saying all these years, all that depressing stuff about carcinomas and melanomas and long-term skin damage and faces that can end up looking like the underside of Buffalo Bill’s saddle--it’s all coming true. And Southern California’s sizzling love affair with the sun is quickly evolving into we’re-just-good-friends.

“People, as they get older, are becoming more sun-conscious,” said Dr. Gerald Weinstein, professor of dermatology at UC Irvine. “They’re afraid to have the same degree of sun damage that they were getting in the past, and they’re more aware of it than they were five years ago.

“I think (the realization) is hitting people in their 20s, but I don’t think the teen-agers have gotten the message yet. To hide under a hat or sunscreen isn’t their way of doing things yet. They think they’re going to live forever. They don’t realize sun exposure can be dangerous.”

Today, skin cancers are by far the most common cancers in the United States, numbering more than a half-million new cases each year and accounting for one of every five reported cancers. It is estimated that one in every 10 Americans will develop some form of skin cancer. And most of these cancers--as many as 90% of the carcinomas--can be traced to overexposure to the sun.

The incidence of malignant melanomas, the most deadly form of skin cancer, is increasing faster than any other type of cancer except lung cancer among women. There are more than 27,000 new acases each year in the United States, and in the South and Southwest, where the sun is stronger, about 26 out of every 100,000 people can expect to develop a malignant melanoma.

An estimated 7,800 Americans will die this year as a result of some form of skin cancer, according to the American Cancer Society.

Also worrisome to many formerly devoted sun worshipers is the prospect of premature aging of the skin, another byproduct of overexposure to ultraviolet rays.

This combination of threats has caused a rapidly rising level of consciousness about the dangers of sun exposure, as well as some reappraisal among adults about the benefits of sunbathing and the fashionableness of a deep tan.

Take the Bain de Soleil model, for instance. Her current lighter shade is a response to a company survey asking respondents to choose which shade they preferred. Only about 10% of the respondents preferred a dark tan, while more than half liked what the company called “the medium golden honey color.”

Bain de Soleil’s literature quotes Janet Carlson Freed, editor of European Travel & Life magazine, as asserting that in the United States and Europe, “Color is definitely still in, but the deep, dark tan is not.”

“I’m seeing people who wish they could tan, because they’re still programmed to want it, but today their No. 1 concern is skin aging and the No. 2 is skin cancer,” said Mina Law, owner of the Institute for Skin Therapy in Costa Mesa. “People are really trying to not spend so much time in the sun.”

Coppertone, too, has done consumer studies that show that lighter skin is in.

“I don’t think the look of the tan has gone away,” said JoAnne Brown, a Coppertone spokeswoman. “People still want that look. But they’re getting a lot smarter about exposure to the sun. They’re still going out there, but they’re using higher SPF sunscreen products and getting more educated. They know that the sun doesn’t forget.”

And the solar memory can be ruthless. The body itself can heal other injuries, but skin retains the effects of sun damage throughout each person’s life. The effects of a couple of long teen-age summers at the beach may not show up for 20 years or more. But, in one form or another, they will show up.

“There’s a certain amount of damage that will have it’s effect 10 or 20 years down the pike,” said Weinstein. “A certain amount of (recent) damage appears to be reversible, but you’re not going to remove the old damage. Some of that is going to creep up from the early years.”

Particularly disturbing, he said, is the fact that malignant melanoma “seems to have a history in some of these individuals who had a severe sunburn when they were younger.” In other words, the majority of melanoma patients suffered in their youths at least one blistering sunburn.

Today, that sunburn need never occur. But to be armed against harmful rays, one must learn certain new behaviors and new anatomical and scientific language.

It is important, skin specialists say, to remember that skin is an organ, the largest in the body, and acts as a kind of shield for internal organs. It protects itself from the sun’s rays by producing, in one of the upper layers, melanin, the brown pigment that appears as tanned skin. (This naturally protective agent is produced in greater quantities in dark-skinned people, such as olive Mediterranean-type skin or black skin; skin cancers are more common in light-skinned people.)

While tanning offers some protection, any prolonged exposure to the sun produces cumulative damage to the basal, or lower layer of skin, causing a loss of elasticity. And, because the skin thins with age, its natural sun defenses erode as we grow older.

There are two villains in the scenario: ultraviolet rays classified as A and B. UVA rays are present year-round and are particularly strong in the early morning and late afternoon when the sun is at an angle. Their longer wavelengths penetrate more deeply into the skin. Once thought to be safe, they can cause aging, wrinkling and can contribute to skin cancer.

UVB rays are of shorter wavelength and are the most common cause of sunburn. They are more intense in summer months (particularly between the hours of about 10 a.m. and 2 p.m.), at higher altitudes and nearer the Equator. Rays reflected off sand, water or snow are even more intense.

Until about 15 years ago, the only way for the fair-skinned to win this battle was to stay out of the sun. Today, however, the first line of defense is represented by three letters: SPF.

It stands for Sun Protection Factor and it has become the summertime argot of the pale. Today, sun care products bear an SPF number, from 2 to 45, and the higher the number the greater the protection. (A lotion with an SPF of 15, for instance, allows one to stay in the sun 15 times longer than usual before burning.)

The rule of thumb: The lighter your skin, the higher SPF you need.

That the public has become conversant with this new sunscreen language is a kind of small revolution, said Dr. Matthew Goodman, co-director of the UCI Melanoma and Skin Cancer Center.

“Without question,” he said, “the biggest change has been the use by the public of sunscreen products. I think that’s wonderful, and I think it’ll make an impact on reducing skin cancers in the future. We’ll have to wait a few decades before we see that effect, though.”

The wider use of sun care products has been a bonanza for the companies that make them. One market estimate reported that sun care product sales amount to $350 million to $400 million annually and are growing at a rate of more than 10% each year.

Still, dermatologists and others say, the best sun is no sun.

“Most people think that sun block is complete protection,” Law said, “but it really isn’t. There’s still damage potential.”

The second line of defense? Clothes. And not wispy, translucent coverings that admit light but tightly woven garments and hats that block the sun entirely. But doesn’t that look a little wimpy? Ask a lifeguard.

“We’re very leery of the sun,” said Eric Bauer, a marine safety officer with the Newport Beach Lifeguards. “We have tops on all our Jeeps and all of us guys basically try to wear long-sleeved shirts and use sunscreen and wear hats and stay out of the sun as much as possible. You get enough sun even taking those precautions.”

Today’s lifeguards, Bauer said, have seen what the sun has done to older counterparts who may not have taken proper precautions.

“Some of the older lifeguards have had bouts with early cancer symptoms,” he said, “and we’re very conscious of it. These are our careers, and we figure we’re going to be here for 20 years. We don’t want problems down the line.”

And if Bauer and his co-workers need any extra incentive, they only need look around.

“It’s real obvious that some of the people who come to the beach have spent a lot of time in the sun,” Bauer said. “They still fry themselves out there. But we did the same thing when we were younger. When you’re young, you feel like you’re bulletproof.”

However, that is the time of life when sun protection is the most critical, sun care specialists say. Children, they say, spend three times as many hours in the sun as adults. Consequently, an estimated 80% of a person’s lifetime sun damage is done before age 20.

Many companies now include high-SPF products specifically for children.

Still, many children continue to learn the hard way.

Leslie Cyril, community relations manager at UCI Clinical Cancer Center, remembers trying to tan as a redheaded teen-ager.

“I was your typical teen-ager,” she said, “because when you’re that age you want to get tan or they’ll make fun of you and you look like you don’t belong. But I found when I was out in the sun more than an hour sunbathing, I’d get sick--very bad headaches and hot flashes. When I was young, about 12, I got a really bad sunburn and had to be on medication and stay in bed for two weeks.

“You get to the point, though, when you reach a certain age, where you’re too smart to buy into the peer pressure. Now I don’t sunbathe at all, and I avoid sitting in the sun. If I have to be outside, say for an outdoor wedding, I wear sunscreen and a big hat. I don’t even let people open their sunroofs when I’m in the car.

“In Southern California,” she said, “pale may still not be in, but the smart people know to stay out of the sun.”

The Signs of Skin Cancer

If there is an all-purpose maxim in the battle against skin cancer, it is this: Know thyself. Know all of thyself.

That means every inch of your skin because skin cancer can appear anywhere.

The American Cancer Society recommends a monthly self-examination of your skin, from head to toe, using a full-length mirror and a hand mirror. The idea is to note all the pigmented areas of your skin--freckles, moles, birthmarks and other noticeable spots and see whether they change.

Here’s what you’re looking for:

* Basal cell carcinoma. The most common form of skin cancer (it accounts for 75% of all skin cancers), it often appears first as a small round or oval patch, usually white or gray, shiny and hard, but sometimes pink or red and scaly.

The cancer is slow-growing and doesn’t spread to other parts of the body, but it does have a high rate of recurrence.

It is treated by excision under local anesthesia.

* Squamous cell carcinoma. Like the basal cell variety, squamous cell carcinomas usually appear on areas of the skin exposed to the sun. They are similar in appearance to basal cell carcinomas, but they tend to be redder and more swollen. They are likely to spread to other parts of the body. They are treated in much the same way as basal cell carcinomas.

* Malignant melanoma. This is the least common but the most dangerous type of skin cancer (5% of skin cancers but 75% of skin-cancer deaths), and it can occur on any part of the body, whether or not exposed to sun. It can spread to other parts of the body. If the cancer is detected early, the recovery rate is high.

The American Cancer Society has developed an aid to spotting melanomas, that might be called the “ABCDE characteristics”:

A for asymmetry : Half of the mole doesn’t match the other.

B for border irregularity : The edges are ragged, notched or blurred.

C for color : The color is not uniform, but may be shades of tan, brown or black, sometimes with patches of red, white or blue.

D for diameter : A diameter greater than a quarter-inch and any that is increasing in size may indicate a melanoma.

E for elevation : A mole raised above the skin surface.