RE: We are killing nuclear workers!

["Taylor, Douglas B" <Dbtaylor@TheITGroup.com>]

I believe the "healthy worker effect" assumes that most nuclear workers are
subjected to mandatory annual physical examinations, which leads to a higher
rate of early detection of cancer, which then leads to a lower death rate
from cancer.  I have not been able to find any studies done on this
assumption, however.

Doug Taylor

-----Original Message-----
From: ruth_weiner [mailto:ruth_weiner@email.msn.com]
Sent: Friday, January 05, 2001 11:32 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: Re: We are killing nuclear workers!


Has anyone got any ideas about the mechanism of the "healthy worker effect?"
I do not understand how adequate health benefits reduce the likelihood of
cancer occurrence.  I mean, one doesn't make use of those benefits usually
unless one is sick.  Even mammograms are an early detection mechanism, not a
prevention mechanism.

Ruth Weiner
ruth_weiner@msn.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Otto G. Raabe <ograabe@ucdavis.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list <radsafe@romulus.ehs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Friday, January 05, 2001 8:59 AM
Subject: Re: We are killing nuclear workers!


>At 12:55 AM 1/5/01 -0600, Herman Cember wrote:
>>
>>I believe that the enrichment plants had radiation safety programs.  I
also
>>believe that the best defense of the health and safety record of workerss
in
>>the nuclear industry is to poin out that all the studies (of whch I know)
>>find the standard mortality ratios (SMR) for workers in nuclear
facilities,
>>including laboratories, production facilities, and nuclear power plants,
to
>>be much less than 1.  I believe that the SMR's for all causes of death run
>on
>>the order of 0.8 - 0.9.  Am I correct in my figures?  I also believe that
>the
>>next worker to die from radiation in the United States commercial nuclear
>>power industry will be the first one.  This certainly cannot be said of
the
>>safety record of the fossil fuel generating stations.
>>                                                             Herman Cember
>***************************************************************************
**
>January 5, 2001
>Davis, CA
>
>Yes, but the answer that is usually given is that this is the "healthy
>worker effect". Nuclear workers were healthy when hired and they got good
>health care benefits from their employment. Because of this assumption,
>most epidemiological studies of nuclear workers compare those with "high"
>doses to those with "low" doses and ignore SMR's. That is also what has
>been done in the atomic bomb survivor studies by RERF.
>
>Otto
>**********************************************
>Prof. Otto G. Raabe, Ph.D., CHP
>Institute of Toxicology & Environmental Health
>(Street Address: Bldg. 3792, Old Davis Road)
>University of California, Davis, CA 95616
>E-Mail: ograabe@ucdavis.edu
>Phone: (530) 752-7754   FAX: (530) 758-6140
>***********************************************
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