Comments on "Breast cancer: evidence for a relation to fission products in the diet".
For over 30 years, Ernest Sternglass (recently joined by Jay Gould) has claimed that large occurrences of health effects result from small exposures to ionizing radiation. A recent study published in the Journal claimed to show a "supralinear" dose-effect relationship versus curies per million persons. The authors of this article show that Sternglass and Gould did not follow accepted scientific methods, never calculated the dose equivalent to the population studied, misinterpreted the raw data, and did not evaluate any possible confounding factors that could influence the observed breast cancer mortality. The reanalysis of the raw data shows that, while there may have been changes in the mortality patterns from breast cancer in the four geographical regions reported, Sternglass and Gould failed to demonstrate a relationship between the operational histories of the Haddam Neck, Millstone, and Indian Point reactors and breast cancer mortality.
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D000396:Air Pollutants, Radioactive / Q000009:adverse effects*; D015982:Bias; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000209:etiology* / Q000401:mortality; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D004307:Dose-Response Relationship, Radiation; D005260:Female; D005507:Food Contamination, Radioactive; D006801:Humans; D009381:Neoplasms, Radiation-Induced / Q000209:etiology* / Q000401:mortality; D011210:Power Plants; D012307:Risk Factors; D016019:Survival Analysis; D014481:United States
D000396:Air Pollutants, Radioactive