[ RadSafe ] " German doctor takes..." / Childhood leukemia ALL

[Bjorn Cedervall]

At least three factors have been shown to associate MUCH stronger with ALL than vicinity to nuclear power plants:1. Consumption of hot dogs among Californian children:Peters et al., Processed meats and risk of childhood leukemia, Cancer, Causes and Control, Vol. 5, 1994:195-202. (OR=5.8 for more than 12 "hot dog meals per month", p<0.001)2. Infection with C adenovirus during pregnancy: B. Gustafsson et al., Br. J. Cancer, Vol. 97, 2007:992-994. (OR=5.2, 95 % c.i.:1.3-31, p<0.012)3. Heavy car traffic: Savitz & Feingold, Association of childhood cancer with residential traffic density, Scand. J. Work Envron. Health, Vol. 15, 1989:360-3. (OR=4.7, 95 % c.i.: 1.6-13.5).
(This was in Boulder Colorado BTW... same children as those who Wertheimer and Leeper referred to - and much stronger correlation than the one with power lines - but this finding did not create headlines...).Not breast feeding the child enough has a stronger association (OR=1.71) with ALL than the the one relating to the German NPPs.I here insert a quote from an Editorial (E.W. Campion, Power Lines, Cancer, and Fear, New England J. Medicine, Vol. 337, 1997:44-46):"It is sad that hundreds of millions of dollars have gone into studies that never had much promise of finding a way to prevent the tragedy of cancer in children. The many inconclusive and inconsistent studies have generated worry and fear and have given peace of mind to no one. The 18 years of research have produced considerable paranoia, but little insight and no prevention. It is time to stop wasting our research resources. We should redirect them to research that will be able to discover the true biologic causes of the leukemic clones that threaten the lives of our children.”My personal opinion about this is that we see more witch hunting and politics than science in much of the related massmedial fallout following missions like the one the German doctor takes.Bjorn Cedervall, StockholmBackground and affiliations (these institutions may or may not agree with my ideas):Associated professor (Medical Radiation Biology), PhD (Faculty of Medicine, Karolinska Institutet)MSc (Nuclear Chemistry and Biochemistry, Royal Institute of Technology)Radiology Specialist (Vattenfall Power Consultant AB)
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