[ RadSafe ] Cohen's radon results differently

Tue Sep 20 21:32:01 CDT 2011

Hi Chris:

As Mike pointed out, sometimes other factors strongly influence statistics.

Perhaps Mike was referring to an international story in the spring of 1980
about Grand Junction, Colorado in Mesa County and the surprising increase in
cancer rates.  Even friends in London contacted me about these statistics.
There was concern about the use of uranium mill tailings in the construction
of residential structures in Mesa County.

As it turned out, the reporter divided the "new" annual cancer cases
reported by St. Mary's Hospital by the population of Mesa County, giving a
quite high number. After an investigation, St. Mary's new regional cancer
center, servicing all of Western Colorado and Eastern Utah, revealed that
the cancer rates for people from Mesa County were actually quite low. 

Dan ii

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-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu
[mailto:radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of Brennan, Mike
(DOH)
Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2011 17:50
To: The International Radiation Protection (Health Physics) MailingList
Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Cohen's radon results differently

Hi, Chris.  

I believe this is indeed a reasonable consideration.  Long ago I heard a
story about an anti-nuke group that tried to get a nuclear power plant
shut down a couple of years after start-up by showing that there had
been a substantial increase in the number of deaths in the county the
plant was located in.  A closer look at the data showed the correct
correlation was an increase in the number of deaths in the county and
the opening of a new hospital, in part funded by the power plant.  The
new hospital not only served a county that previously had no hospital,
but also several surrounding counties that had no hospital.  I don't
remember the name of the plant, so I can't check on the validity of this
story, but neither the statistics not the alleged misrepresentation by
the antis strike me as unreasonable. 

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu
[mailto:radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of Chris Hofmeyr
Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2011 2:01 PM
To: The International Radiation Protection (Health Physics) Mailing
List; Bernard L. Cohen
Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Cohen's radon results differently

Mike Brennan, prof Cohen,

The thought has crossed my mind whether specifically some lung cancer
sufferers
in small population counties might migrate to larger centres for
treatment and
care prior to their death being recorded there. On the other hand, lung
cancer
(LC) mortality against the county rank of population size follows the
smoking
trend against the same. The enormous range of county population (700 to
5.3
million)is selectively (and fortuitously) condensed in the rank plot
such that
the LC and smoking plots are ~linear.

Sincerely
chris.hofmeyr at webmail.co.za 

On Tue, 20 Sep 2011 13:20:35 -0400 "Bernard L. Cohen" <blc at pitt.edu>
wrote

> My analyses excluded the retirement states, Florida, California, and
> Arizona, although including them did not change the results. I did
> present evidence that movement of people was not a serious problem,
but
> I do not remember the details; it gave data on distance from death
> location to where most of their lives were spent. I can look this up
if
> you consider it to be very important.
> 
> On 9/19/2011 7:20 PM, Brennan, Mike (DOH) wrote:
> > Another confounder, I would expect, is the movement of people.  For
> > example, my in-laws moved to a retirement home near us, about two
years
> > before my mother-in-law died (not of cancer).  Any statistics pegged
to
> > the county in which she died would introduce error into any study
other
> > than one about end-of-life care, as the conditions in this county
have
> > nothing to do with here long term health.  I would estimate that
well
> > over half of the people at this large retirement facility are from
out
> > of the county, and not a few from out of the state.  This effect has
to
> > be even greater for places like Florida.
> >
> > The unlikely political bedfellows of Hilary Clinton and Newt
Gingrich
> > have teamed up to support a national health records program (though
> > neither has spoken much about it recently).  The cost savings, both
in
> > lives and in money, would be substantial, but I see even greater
> > possibilities in terms of being able to get MUCH better data for
studies
> > such as this.  Imagine if instead of estimates of smoking prevalence
you
> > could CONTROL for smoking habits of the case and control cohorts.
> >
> > There are people who contend that such a system is too much of an
> > intrusion into privacy, and that the couple tens of thousands of
people
> > who die each year due to incomplete or inaccessible medical records
is a
> > fair price to pay.  While I don't think they are right, I think they
> > will probably win until the Facebook generation takes the lead.
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu
> > [mailto:radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of Bernard L.
> > Cohen
> > Sent: Monday, September 19, 2011 3:55 PM
> > To: Chris Hofmeyr
> > Cc: radsafe at agni.phys.iit.edu; WesVanPelt at verizon.net
> > Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Cohen's radon results differently
> >
> > To do anything, I would need some credible source of smoking
prevalence
> > data. I tried several and they did not change my results. Please
suggest
> >
> > an alternative.
> >
> > On 9/18/2011 3:31 PM, Chris Hofmeyr wrote:
> >>
> >> Radsafers,
> >> On 19th June Howard Long challenged my reminder that in Cohen's
> > US-wide study
> >> of domestic radon and lung cancer, there was, on average, a
negative
> >> correlation between Cohen's smoking prevalence and the average
county
> > radon
> >> concentration. Howard wanted numbers.
> >> On 20th June prof Cohen invited further discussion of his work.  
> > etc.

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