AW: [ RadSafe ] AW: Low level radiation and cancer:

[Christian Hofmeyr]

Dear Prof Cohen,
I intend voicing my concerns as soon as practicable, but
the Radsafe format (text) inhibits proper arguments
substantiated by diagrams. It might still take some time.

Incidentally, my (general) remark referred to the last
paragraph of my previous posting, which is relevant to your
study as well as epidemiological ones:

"Another problem is the effect of confounding changes in
lifestyle with time. Particularly lung cancer is very
problematic in this regard. The SEER statistics for the USA
show a very large gender differential in mortality of
almost a factor 5 during the 1970s, which narrowed
dramatically subsequently due to a levelling out and slight
decline of male lung cancer mortality, coupled with a
simultaneous steep rise in female LC mortality since the
1970s. These dramatic changes are most probably due to
changing smoking behaviour. This should give an indication
of the problems confronting domestic radon studies."

Regards
Chris.Hofmeyr at webmail.co.za



On Fri, 12 Aug 2005 11:26:40 -0400
 Bernard Cohen <blc+ at pitt.edu> wrote:
>
>
>Christian Hofmeyr wrote:
>
>>Rainer,
>>Thanks for your response.  I think we agree on important
>>points.  What I wanted to emphasise is that the most
>>sensitive direct test of LNT can be devised by its
>>prediction regarding collective dose, probably in the
>>framework of an ecological study.  I am very respectful
>of
>>prof Cohen’s work on radon (per implication based on
>>collective lung dose) and his willingness to make his
>data
>>available for scrutiny. However, as I tried to point out
>in
>>a closing remark, there are IMO serious problems
>concerning
>>particularly lung cancer, and I intend to comment more in
>>due course.
>>  
>>
>---Please let me know as soon as practcal about these
>"serious problems"
>

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