Re: Why study baby teeth?

["ruth_weiner" <ruth_weiner@email.msn.com>]

There was an excellent article on clusters in the New Yorker about 6 months
ago (by Malcolm Gladwell, I think).  The article pointed out that geographic
clusters almost never survive close scrutiny.  There are disease clusters,
but they are not generally dependent on geography: there are several AIDS
clusters, for example, that are related to certain practices and to a
particular procedure (blood transfusion); food poisoning episodes usually
affect a cluster of the the people who ate the food, and so on.

One of the supposed clusters that did not withstand scrutiny was the
"cluster" of spontaneous miscarriages in Alsea, OR, downstream from heavy
pesticide use by a timber company -- it turned out that there was not a
significantly (in the statistical sense) greater incidence of miscarriage in
Alsea than in the U. S. as a whole.  Another was the Wertheimer and Leeper
childhood leukemia "cluster" of residents from whose houses you could see
electric transmission lines (remember the EMF scare?).

People you know, even your neighbors, generally don't constitute a
statistically valid population.  Two women in my block (about 25 families)
are blind.  This is unusual, but a cluster?  I don't think so.

Ruth Weiner
ruth_weiner@msn.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Norman & Karen Cohen <norco@bellatlantic.net>
To: Multiple recipients of list <radsafe@romulus.ehs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wednesday, August 09, 2000 9:13 PM
Subject: Re: Why study baby teeth?


>Sorry Bob,
>I live near Toms River, and there are cancer clusters there, clusters
recognized
>by the US and New Jersey Governments. The question we are trying to answer
with
>the TFP is - to what degree did the low level radiation emitted and leaked
by
>Oyster Creek Nuke contribute to these clusters, especially in combination
with
>the chemical pollution from Ciba-Geigy and other chemical companies. -
>
>
>
>Norm
>
>Bob Flood wrote:
>
>> >> A  cancer cluster in Toms River, recognized by the Federal Government
is
>> =
>> >--
>
>Coalition for Peace and Justice and the UNPLUG Salem Campaign; 321 Barr
Ave.,
>Linwood, NJ 08221; 609-601-8537 or 609-601-8583 (8583: fax, answer
machine);
>norco@bellatlantic.net;  UNPLUG SALEM WEBSITE:  http://www.unplugsalem.org/
>COALITION FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE WEBSITE:
>http://members.bellatlantic.net/~norco/  ICQ# 54268619; The Coalition for
Peace
>and Justice is a chapter of Peace Action.
>“We have two lives, the one we’re given, and the other one we make” (Mary
Chapin
>Carpenter)
>“Get up, stand up, stand up for your rights...Get up, stand up, don’t give
up
>the fight!” (Bob Marley)
>
>
>
>
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