[ RadSafe ] Proximity to Power Lines at Birth May Increase Leukemia Risk

[John Jacobus]

You have a good point.  I am sure that there are lots
of studies on chemicals and leukemia.  Maybe it should
be proposed that some researchers look into this
specific aspect of chemical exposures.

http://www.monitor.net/rachel/r38.html

--- Susan Gawarecki <loc at icx.net> wrote:

> This may be of interest in the ongoing debate about
> health effects of 
> electromagnetic fields.  It also occurs to me that
> families living near 
> power lines are more likely to be exposed to
> herbicide sprays used along 
> the right-of-way.
> 
> Susan Gawarecki
> 
> Proximity to Power Lines at Birth May Increase
> Leukemia Risk
> By Tom Ewing , MedPage Today Staff Writer
> http://www.medpagetoday.com/tbindex1.cfm?tbid=1141
> 
> OXFORD, England, June 2-Children's risk for leukemia
> is slightly higher 
> for those who lived in homes near high-voltage
> overhead electrical lines 
> at birth, according to a large case-control study
> published in BMJ.
> 
> The authors of the study were quick to point out
> that although the 
> evidence suggests a causal relationship between
> overhead power lines and 
> childhood leukemia that the phenomenon may be due to
> chance.
> 
> "The most obvious explanation of the association of
> leukemia with 
> distance from a power line is that it is a
> consequence of exposure to 
> magnetic fields," wrote Gerald Draper, M.D., and
> colleagues at Oxford's 
> Childhood Cancer Research Group.
> 
> "However, we have no satisfactory explanation for
> our results in terms 
> of causation by magnetic fields, and the findings
> are not supported by 
> convincing laboratory data or any accepted
> biological mechanisms."
> 
> In the largest case-control study on the subject,
> the researchers found 
> that compared with those who lived more than 600
> meters from a line at 
> birth, children who lived within 200 meters had a
> relative risk of 
> leukemia of 1.69 (95% CI 1.13-2.53). And compared
> with those who lived 
> between 200 and 600 meters away from a power line,
> they had a relative 
> leukemia risk of 1.23 (95% CI 1.02 -1.49).
> 
> While there was a significant (P <0.01) trend in
> leukemia risk in 
> relation to the reciprocal of distance from a line,
> no excess risk in 
> relation to proximity to lines was found for other
> childhood cancers.
> 
> The researchers used birth registry records to
> identify 29,081 children 
> under age 15 who had been born in England or Wales
> between 1962 and 1995 
> and had been diagnosed with cancer (9,700 with
> leukemia). For each case, 
> the researchers selected from birth registration
> records a control 
> matched for sex, birth date, and birth-registration
> district.
> 
> Using postal codes, the researchers identified those
> who had, at birth, 
> been living within 1 km of a 132-kV, 275-kV, or
> 400-kV overhead power 
> lines. For 93% of the addresses, the researchers
> obtained a 0.1-meter 
> grid reference, with which they calculated the
> shortest distance to any 
> of the transmission lines that had existed in the
> subjects' year of 
> birth. This enabled the researchers to develop a
> complete set of 
> accurate distances for all subjects within 600
> meters of a line.
> 
> On the basis of their investigation, the researchers
> concluded that 
> there is an association between childhood leukemia
> and proximity of home 
> address at birth to high-voltage power lines. The
> apparent risk extends 
> to a greater distance than would have been expected
> from previous 
> studies, they reported.
> 
> Although few children in England and Wales live
> close to high-voltage 
> power lines at birth, the researchers noted, "there
> is a slight 
> tendency" for the birth addresses of children with
> leukemia to be close 
> to these lines than those of matched controls.
> 
> To put the risk in perspective, the researchers
> wrote that assuming that 
> the higher risk of high-voltage lines is indeed a
> consequence of 
> proximity to the lines, then of the 400 to 420 cases
> of childhood 
> leukemia occurring annually in England and Wales,
> about five would be 
> associated with power lines.
> 
> This study returns to the long-held (1979) concern
> that the 
> low-frequency magnetic fields produced by power
> lines may be associated 
> with cancer, especially childhood cancer.
> 
> In 2001, the International Agency for Research on
> Cancer classified 
> extremely low-frequency magnetic fields as "possibly
> carcinogenic" on 
> the basis of limited epidemiological evidence and
> "inadequate" evidence 
> from animals.
> 
> Expressing skepticism in a commentary accompanying
> the BMJ study, 
> Heather Dickinson, Ph.D., a researcher at the
> University of Newcastle 
> upon Tyne, wrote:
> 
> "Magnetic fields from power lines are very weak, so
> it would be 
> surprising if they caused leukemia. The increased
> risk closer to power 
> lines may reflect some other factor that varies
> geographically.
> 
> "However, this study did not include estimates or
> measures of the 
> magnetic field from either the power lines or other
> sources.
> 
> "We don't yet fully understand the etiology of
> childhood leukemia. 
> Nevertheless, we are now reasonably sure that it
> often involves damage 
> to DNA before birth, probably in response to
> infection, chemicals, 
> ionizing radiation, or other environmental
> exposures. "
> 
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+++++++++++++++++++
"Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea and never shrinks back to its original proportion." -- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

-- John
John Jacobus, MS
Certified Health Physicist
e-mail:  crispy_bird at yahoo.com


		
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