Is there a link between leukemia and nuclear power?

IPPNW-Germany's study this week finds that there is a correlation between developing cancer before one's fifth birthday and the distance between home and a nuclear power plant.

Published on Friday, December 14, 2007 by Reformer.com
By Bob Audette, Reformer Staff

BRATTLEBORO -- While no one can deny radiation exposure is not healthy for living organisms, studies conducted since nuclear power became one of the major sources of electricity in the United States have concluded there is no link between it and cancer.
However, a study of childhood leukemia released this week by the German branch of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War reported "there is a correlation between the distance of the home from the nearest nuclear power plant and the risk of developing cancer before (the) fifth birthday."

The study's authors cautioned however, that "the present status of radiobiological and epidemiological knowledge does not allow the conclusion that ionizing radiation emitted by German nuclear power plants during normal operation is the cause."

"There's a fair probability that the results they got were strictly by chance association," said William Irwin, the radiological health chief with Vermont's Department of Health, who admitted he hasn't yet read the whole study.

However, he said, the authors of the report are highly respected and it's crucial that studies such as that from the IPPNW continue.

"It's extremely important for those in public health and academia to continually look at the information about health outcomes of those who live near the facilities and those who work at these facilities," said Irwin.

In 1991, a study conducted by the National Cancer Institute concluded "the risks for childhood leukemia, adult leukemia and all cancers were about the same in the counties with nuclear installations as in the control counties."

In fact, stated the report, those concerned about the effects of ionizing radiation on their bodies and their children's bodies would be better served by limiting the effects of cigarette smoke, radon and an unhealthy diet.

Closer to home, the NCI report stated leukemia deaths in children ages 10 to 19 in Windham County had actually decreased in the 19 years between 1972 - the year Vermont Yankee in Vernon began producing electricity - and 1991, when the study was conducted.

The Vernon Elementary School -- which is a mere 1,000 yards from the General Electric boiling water reactor inside Yankee's containment vessel -- was built in 1954, 18 years before Vermont Yankee came on line. If radiation emitted by the plant was causing cancer in children, conclude many supporters of nuclear power, in the 35 years since the plant opened why haven't cancer rates increased in children who have attended the school?

When Vermont Yankee started producing power, said Irwin, Vermont was the regulatory body because the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had not yet been established. At the time, regulators discovered radiation emission levels were higher than acceptable.

"They installed a special shield wall to reduce those radiation levels," said Irwin. That level of cooperation is an indication of the desire of both state regulators and the operators of Yankee to protect the public health, he said.

The 2006 surveillance report of Vermont Yankee released in June 2007 by Vermont's Department of Health would seem to support the conclusion that measures taken to limit the public's exposure to radiation are working.

The report stated that "cancer incidence and cancer mortality rates in the communities around Vermont Yankee were found not to differ significantly from those in the rest of Windham County, Vermont or the United States."

Comparisons to long-term historical trends "show no significant increased radiological exposures due to Vermont Yankee nuclear power station operations," stated the report.

"That's the whole basis for regulatory limits," said Irwin. "You attempt to establish them where you will not see statistical significant differences (between those exposed to radiation and those not exposed)."

Even with an increase of power production by 20 percent in 2006, radiological readings around the plant "appear to support the premise that the (newly installed) turbine shield negates the increased direct gamma radiation levels of the extended power uprate," according to the surveillance report.

"For all cancer types combined, the rate of cancer incidence in the six towns near Vermont Yankee is lower compared to the rest of Vermont and the United States as a whole," stated the report. "Characterizations that one population is at more risk or at less risk as compared to another are not valid."

As a whole, stated the report, cancer rates for white males and females in the United States average 489 cases per 100,000 people. "In the six towns near Vermont Yankee, the all cancer incidence rate is 434 cases per 100,000 persons." People in those six towns "were diagnosed with fewer cancers between 1994 and 2003 than Vermont and the U.S."

While it appears that deaths from leukemia in the six towns "may be higher in Windham County the difference is not statistically significant." While the state average for leukemia is 7.6 deaths per 100,000 people, that number is 8.33 per 100,000 in Windham County.

Cancer and nuclear power was on Sally Shaw's mind when she submitted a petition for rulemaking to the NRC in 2006. Shaw, a Gill, Mass., resident, asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to reconcile a 2005 National Academy of Sciences report on the dangers of ionizing radiation with standards in the NRC's generic environmental impact study for nuclear power plants.

The 700-page NAS report stated "there is no safe level or threshold of ionizing radiation exposure. Even exposure to background radiation causes some cancers. Additional exposures cause additional risks."

The report stated that one in 100 members of the public would get cancer "if exposed to 100 millirems per year for a 70-year lifetime. This is essentially the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's allowable radiation dose for members of the public." The 100 millirems threshold is in addition to any background radiation a member of the public might get from environmental sources.

The NAS study also concluded that nuclear workers have an increased risk of cancer if exposed to the NRC upper limits of radiation for industrial employees.

However, on Dec. 12, the NRC rejected Shaw's petition.

"The overall risk estimates of the report remain(s) statistically insignificant," wrote the NRC in its decision. "The NRC staff concluded that the findings presented in the report agree with the NRC's current understanding of the health risks of exposure to ionizing radiation. None of the findings represent new and significant information "

The NAS and IPPNW reports are just two of many that have been written on the subject of the effects of ionizing radiation from nuclear power plants.

A study conducted after the Three Mile Island Accident in 1979 concluded there were no increases in cancer mortality in populations living within a five-mile radius of the power plant in Harrisburg, Pa.

The study, released in 2000, which was conducted by the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health, reviewed cancer rates between 1979 and 1992.

"Scientists have calculated that the average person present in the area during the 10 days after the incident was exposed to considerably less radiation than the annual dose an individual receives from the everyday environment in the United States," wrote the researchers.

However, wrote the authors, while they found "no consistent evidence suggesting that the low-dose radiation released during the TMI accident had a measurable impact on the mortality of those living in the area for 13 years after the event, they acknowledge that further study is warranted."

A study released a year later, conducted by the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering, concluded there were "no meaningful associations among the cancers studied (pediatric leukemia, adult chronic leukemia, multiple myeloma, and thyroid cancer) and proximity to Connecticut Yankee nuclear power plant (in Haddam Neck)."

Also in 2001, the American Cancer Society concluded that cancer clusters "do not occur more often near nuclear plants than they do by chance elsewhere in the population."

As far as the health of power plant workers is concerned, a 2004 report issued by Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, which looked at more than 53,000 nuclear power workers, concluded the workers were "less likely to die from cancer or non-cancer diseases due, in large measure, to the so-called 'healthy worker effect.'"

Employees of the nuclear industry "have to be healthy and are usually required to have annual medical check-ups," the so-called "healthy worker effect."

The study, which tracked employees from 15 nuclear utilities from 1979 to 1997 concluded the workers had mortality rates that were 60 percent lower than similar populations around the country.

The results related to workers at nuclear power plants "is strong support for the regulatory limits that exist," said Irwin.

At the same time, concluded the report, researchers found a "statistically significant association between radiation dose and death from arteriosclerotic heart disease, including coronary heart disease," warranting further study.

A report from the NRC stated studies that contradict the plethora of studies conducted over the years often are flawed because they didn't examine the effects of other risk factors, used small sample sizes, did not conduct environmental sampling and analysis, chose to ignore data that did not "fit" their conclusions and were not subjected to peer review.

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