‘It sounds like a character from a Harry Potter film’, I said to the Doctor. He cracked a smile that broke free momentarily from his otherwise serious demeanour. Squamous. That word I liked. Carcinoma I was less happy about. ‘It’s not life-threatening, and we can treat it,’ he continued. This was not what the poor Duchess of York heard, as we’ve recently learnt. She’s been diagnosed with an aggressive form of skin cancer. Melanoma kills 23,000 people in the UK every year.

‘Have you ever got sunburnt?’, the young GP continued as he typed. ‘I hate the sun’ I replied sideways on. ‘Always hated it as a child. I used to wear a peaked cap to stop freckles spreading across my face.’ (Ed: I was born vain).  My tone was slight outrage. The unfairness!

Then I realised I was talking utter baloney. As I was blethering on about always being careful, I time-travelled back to the 1980s…that holiday in Crete in the summer of my final year at university. I was lying on the roof of the three-storey apartment for the whole of the last day.  I was desperate to get a full tan for the Farewell Ball. By the evening I was red raw, unable to bend my legs. I stood for the whole of the return flight slavered in Greek yogurt. A week later my backless dress was accessorized with third-degree burns.

Now at least there’s a media explosion of information about why not to do stuff like that, thanks to Fergie’s sad announcement. We need to be proactive as there’s no skin cancer UK screening (although some NHS service providers offer mole mapping for those identified at risk with ultra fair skin, occupational exposure, or genetic predisposition and so on). For the rest of us, it’s all about monthly mole hunts to identify any itchy little blighters.

We have yet more cheerful slogans to learn, like know your ABCDE!  Look out for dark patches that are Asymmetric; Borders that are irregular; Colours that vary, and so on. In terms of prevention, the new phrase is Slip, Slop, Slap. Slip on your t-shirt, slop on the suncream and slap on a hat.

Of course, these will help. But I return to my original point. I’ve always done this Doc!  Can it be any coincidence that last summer was the hottest on record? No matter how careful you are, these days, it’s so easy to get burnt. How many of us follow the advice and stay out of the sun between 11am and 4pm but still get caught?  

Take last summer. I was super careful in Turkey at the end of July. Queen of the oversized Kaftan, my floppy hat was so wide, I would get wedged in doorways. But just once, after taking a bit too long to meander along a picturesque quayside, my shoulders looked like a meat rack. No more overseas holidays in hot places for me.

Yet even mountainous mid-Wales in September was treacherous for sunburn. There was an unprecedented heatwave. Sheep looked like they needed oxygen, standing motionless in the sparse shade. Leaves were burnt crisp. One reservoir was so low, it revealed the remains of ancient dwellings not seen for a millennium! We had to abort an attempt to get atop a ruined castle. It was only a short climb, but the heat was so intense we were forced to retreat, looking like two giant beetroots sweating bullets.

In his new book Fevered Planet, John Vidal explains how diseases and conditions fatal to humans emerge when we harm nature. Climate change is the biggest threat to human health in C21st. And yet here in Winchester we have a system of governance that allow gardens, green spaces and the last urban refuges for nature, to be cannibalised by any old developer. That’s the real cancer that will get us all in the end.