[ RadSafe ] Annual dose from Nature/Background/Man-made sources

Thu Aug 2 02:41:17 CDT 2007

Bernard L. Cohen wrote:
> What is the literature reference for this paper?
>

BMJ  2005;330:223 (29 January), doi:10.1136/bmj.38308.477650.63
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/330/7485/223 

The full report incl. all statistical subtleties (84 pages) is in Scand 
J Work Environ Health 2006;32 suppl 1 
<http://www.sjweh.fi/show_issue.php?issue_id=97>:1-84,
http://www.sjweh.fi/show_abstract.php?abstract_id=982 

regards, pb.

> Peter Bossew wrote:
>> On the very beneficial effects of indoor Rn:
>>
>> Radon in homes and risk of lung cancer: collaborative analysis of 
>> individual data from 13 European case-control studies
>>
>> S Darby, professor of medical statistics1, D Hill, statistician1, A 
>> Auvinen, professor of epidemiology2, J M Barros-Dios, professor of 
>> epidemiology3, H Baysson, statistician4, F Bochicchio, senior 
>> researcher5, H Deo, statistician6, R Falk, principal scientist7, F 
>> Forastiere, professor of epidemiology8, M Hakama, professor of 
>> epidemiology9, I Heid, statistician10, L Kreienbrock, professor of 
>> statistics11, M Kreuzer, epidemiologist12, F Lagarde, statistician13, 
>> I Mäkeläinen, health physicist14, C Muirhead, statistician15, W 
>> Oberaigner, epidemiologist16, G Pershagen, professor of environmental 
>> medicine13, A Ruano-Ravina, professor of epidemiology3, E 
>> Ruosteenoja, scientist14, A Schaffrath Rosario, statistician10, M 
>> Tirmarche, epidemiologist4, L Tomásek, statistician17, E Whitley, 
>> visiting lecturer in medical statistics18, H-E Wichmann, professor of 
>> epidemiology10, R Doll, emeritus professor of medicine1
>>
>> 1 Clinical Trials Service Unit and Epidemiological Studies Unit, 
>> Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford OX2 6HE, 2 School of Public Health, 
>> University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland, 3 Area of Preventive 
>> Medicine and Public Health, University of Santiago de Compostela, 
>> Spain, 4 Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire, 
>> Direction de la Radioprotection de l'Homme, Service de Radiobiologie 
>> et d'Epidémiologie, Fontenay-aux-Roses Cedex, France, 5 Unit of 
>> Radioactivity and its Health Effects, Department of Technology and 
>> Health, Italian National Institute of Health, Rome, Italy, 6 
>> Department of Applied Statistics, University of Reading, Reading RG6 
>> 2AL, 7 Swedish Radiation Protection Authority, SE-171 16, Stockholm, 
>> Sweden, 8 Department of Epidemiology, Rome E Health Authority, Rome, 
>> Italy, 9 Finnish Cancer Registry, Helsinki, Finland, 10 Institute of 
>> Epidemiology, GSF Research Centre for Environment and Health, 
>> Neuherberg, Germany, 11 Institute of Biometry, Epidemiology and 
>> Information Processing, University of Veterinary Medicine, Hannover, 
>> Germany, 12 Department of Radiation Protection and Health, Federal 
>> Office for Radiation Protection, Neuherberg, Germany, 13 Institute of 
>> Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institute, S-171 77, Stockholm, 
>> Sweden, 14 STUK-Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority, Helsinki, 
>> Finland, 15 National Radiological Protection Board, Chilton, Didcot 
>> OX11 0RQ, 16 Tumorregister Tirol, Innsbruck, Austria, 17 Epidemiology 
>> Unit, National Radiation Protection Institute, Prague, Czech 
>> Republic, 18 Department of Social Medicine, University of Bristol, 
>> Bristol BS8 2PR
>>
>> Objective To determine the risk of lung cancer associated with 
>> exposure at home to the radioactive disintegration products of 
>> naturally occurring radon gas
>>
>> Main outcome measures Relative risks of lung cancer and radon gas 
>> concentrations in homes inhabited during the previous 5-34 years 
>> measured in becquerels (radon disintegrations per second) per cubic 
>> metre (Bq/m3) of household air.
>>
>> Results The mean measured radon concentration in homes of people in 
>> the control group was 97 Bq/m3, with 11% measuring > 200 and 4% 
>> measuring > 400 Bq/m3. For cases of lung cancer the mean 
>> concentration was 104 Bq/m3. The risk of lung cancer increased by 
>> 8.4% (95% confidence interval 3.0% to 15.8%) per 100 Bq/m3 increase 
>> in measured radon (P = 0.0007). This corresponds to an increase of 
>> 16% (5% to 31%) per 100 Bq/m3 increase in usual radon---that is, 
>> after correction for the dilution caused by random uncertainties in 
>> measuring radon concentrations. The dose-response relation seemed to 
>> be linear with no threshold and remained significant (P = 0.04) in 
>> analyses limited to individuals from homes with measured radon < 200 
>> Bq/m3. The proportionate excess risk did not differ significantly 
>> with study, age, sex, or smoking. In the absence of other causes of 
>> death, the absolute risks of lung cancer by age 75 years at usual 
>> radon concentrations of 0, 100, and 400 Bq/m3 would be about 0.4%, 
>> 0.5%, and 0.7%, respectively, for lifelong non-smokers, and about 25 
>> times greater (10%, 12%, and 16%) for cigarette smokers.
>>
>> Conclusions Collectively, though not separately, these studies show 
>> appreciable hazards from residential radon, particularly for smokers 
>> and recent ex-smokers, and indicate that it is responsible for about 
>> 2% of all deaths from cancer in Europe.
>>
>>
>> BMJ  2005;330:223 (29 January), doi:10.1136/bmj.38308.477650.63
>> http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/330/7485/223
>>
>>> ....has incontrovertibly been shown....
>> indeed.
>>
>> pb.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: <Rainer.Facius at dlr.de>
>>> To: <Peter.Vernig at va.gov>; <idias at interchange.ubc.ca>; 
>>> <jdaitken at sugar-land.oilfield.slb.com>; <Mike.Brennan at DOH.WA.GOV>; 
>>> <radsafe at radlab.nl>
>>> Sent: Wednesday, August 01, 2007 1:22 AM
>>> Subject: AW: [ RadSafe ] Annual dose from Nature/Background/Man-made 
>>> sources
>>>
>>>
>>> "... a few of us, unfortunately have a very high [radon] exposure if 
>>> we live in a problem house ..."
>>>
>>> Peter:
>>>
>>> Why do you call the 'few of us' unfortunate if indeed the fact of 
>>> being exposed to higher levels of domestic radon has 
>>> incontrovertibly been shown to be associated with significantly 
>>> reduced lung cancer mortality - in line with most other studies, 
>>> which have investigated the association of low dose and dose rate 
>>> exposure to ionizing radiation with lung cancer? Proposed 
>>> explanations of the radon findings by means of confounders abound 
>>> but I have seen none published which was amenable to a quantitative 
>>> analysis and which could be upheld in the light of a subsequent 
>>> quantitative re-analysis by Bernard Cohen.
>>>
>>> Regards, Rainer
>>
-----------------------------------------------------
Peter Bossew 

European Commission (EC) 
Joint Research Centre (JRC) 
Institute for Environment and Sustainability (IES) 

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Email: peter.bossew at jrc.it 

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