Re: Question on Environment Links to Cancer & Incidence Near NuclearFacilities

[Robin_Siskel@notes.ymp.gov]

Hello Amanda and all Radsafers:

An extensive multi-million dollar study was conducted over a number of years
regarding cancer incidence in people living near U.S. nuclear facilities.
Results were released to the public in the early 1990's.  There is some
information about the study on the NIH website I've posted below.  That webpage
also provides links to related information.

http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov/clinpdq/risk/No_Excess_Mortality_Risk_Found_in_Counties_with_Nuclear_Facilities.html

I've copied and printed the initial information from this page below, but more
can be found if you go to the above link.  I'm sure a copy of the entire summary
document (several inches thick) could be obtained by contacting NIH.  I suspect
that the extensive studies of the area surrounding TMI could also provide
interesting information for Amanda's study.  Perhaps another Radsafer could
point her to a contact for the TMI health studies that have been conducted over
the years?  I gather that they are also extensive though certainly not on the
scope of the NIH study.

My best to all of you,

Robin Siskel



No Excess Mortality Risk Found in Counties with Nuclear Facilities

A National Cancer Institute (NCI) survey published in the Journal of the
American Medical Association, March 20, 1991, showed no general increased risk
of death from cancer for people living in 107 U.S. counties containing or
closely adjacent to 62 nuclear facilities. The facilities in the survey had all
begun operation before 1982. Included were 52 commercial nuclear power plants, 9
Department of Energy research and weapons plants, and 1 commercial fuel
reprocessing plant. The survey examined deaths from 16 types of cancer,
including leukemia. In the counties with nuclear facilities, cancer death rates
before and after the startup of the facilities were compared with cancer rates
in 292 similar counties without nuclear facilities (control counties).

The NCI survey showed that, in comparison with the control counties, some of the
study counties had higher rates of certain cancers and some had lower rates,
either before or after the facilities came into service. None of the differences
that were observed could be linked with the presence of nuclear facilities.
"From the data at hand, there was no convincing evidence of any increased risk
of death from any of the cancers we surveyed due to living near nuclear
facilities," said John Boice, Sc.D., who was chief of NCI's Radiation
Epidemiology Branch at the time of the survey.

He cautioned, however, that the counties may be too large to detect risks
present only in limited areas around the plants. "No study can prove the absence
of an effect," said Dr. Boice, "but if any excess cancer risk due to radiation
pollution is present in counties with nuclear facilities, the risk is too small
to be detected by the methods used."

The survey, conducted by Seymour Jabon, Zdenek Hrubec, Sc.D., B.J. Stone, Ph.D.,
and Dr. Boice, was begun in 1987 for scientific purposes in response to American
public health concerns, and after a British survey of cancer mortality in areas
around nuclear installations in the United Kingdom showed an excess of childhood
leukemia deaths near some facilities ("Cancer Near Nuclear Installations," David
Forman, Paula Cook-Mozaffari, Sarah Darby, et al. Nature, October 8, 1987.). No
increases in total cancer mortality were found in the British study, and other
smaller surveys of cancer deaths around nuclear facilities in the United States
and the United Kingdom have yielded conflicting results.

The NCI scientists studied more than 900,000 cancer deaths in the study counties
using county mortality records collected from 1950 to 1984. The researchers
evaluated changes in mortality rates for 16 types of cancer in these counties
from 1950 until each facility began operation and from the start of operation
until 1984. For four facilities in two states (Iowa and Connecticut), cancer
incidence data were also available. Data on cancer incidence in these counties
resembled the county's mortality data patterns.

For each of the 107 study counties, three counties that had populations similar
in income, education, and other socioeconomic factors, but did not have or were
not near nuclear facilities, were chosen for comparison. The study and control
counties were within the same geographic region and usually within the same
state. Over 1.8 million cancer deaths were studied in the control counties.

The numbers of cancer deaths in the study counties and in the control counties
were analyzed and compared to determine the relative risk (RR) of dying of
cancer for persons living near a nuclear facility. A relative risk of 1.00 means
that the risk of dying of cancer was the same in the study and control counties;
any number below 1.00 indicates that the overall risk was lower in the study
county than in the control county; and any number greater than 1.00 indicates a
higher risk in the study county. For example, an RR of 1.04 would indicate that
there was a 4-percent higher risk of cancer death in the study county.
Conversely, an RR of 0.93 would indicate a 7-percent lower risk in the study
county.

For childhood leukemia in children from birth through age 9 years, the overall
RR comparing study and control counties before the startup of the nuclear
facilities was 1.08; after startup the RR was 1.03. These data indicate that the
risk of childhood leukemia in the study counties was slightly greater before
startup of the nuclear facilities than after. The risk of dying of childhood
cancers other than leukemia increased slightly from an RR of 0.94 before the
plants began operation to an RR of 0.99 after the plants began operating.

For leukemia at all ages, the RRs were 1.02 before startup and 0.98 after
startup. For other cancer at all ages, the RRs were essentially the same: 1.00
before startup and 1.01 after startup. These results provide no evidence that
the presence of nuclear facilities influenced cancer death rates in the study
counties.


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