Cancer policy
revere | May 8, 2010President Obama got some advice yesterday from a special Presidential Cancer Panel. The Panel was mandated under the National Cancer Act of 1971 and included a strong staff and leading cancer specialists. The focus was on cancers we get from environmental exposures. It is strong stuff, but it is also stuff experts in cancer epidemiology have known for a long time. Unfortunately the environmental cancer prevention message too often gets submerged in the "you gave cancer to yourself because of how you live" message or triumphant news about the latest therapy for cancer you've already got (the…
revere | April 14, 2009If you have any of your clothes dry cleaned it's more than likely you are being exposed to a chlorinated solvent called PCE (for perchloroethylene aka perc aka tetrachloroethylene/tetrachloroethene). You may be lucky enough to also get some in your drinking water, too (which means you are also breathing it and absorbing it through your skin) -- because PCE is also one of the most prevalent groundwater contaminants in the US. It has some other nice properties: it causes cancer and birth defects and probably autoimmune disease. And it isn't needed to dry clean clothes. Other than that, no…
revere | August 5, 2008The Health Care Renewal blog has made a business of chronicling the undreside of the American health care system: fraud, conflicts of interest by respected academics, bureaucratic incompetence and malfeasance. I do basic research and don't get involved in health care delivery so I only refer to them occasionally, but it's a terrific resource -- if you like that kind of thing. Last week, however, they hit pretty close to home. Not literally, but professionally. I'm a cancer epidemiologist and in a long career have made frequent use of state cancer registries. If you don't know what a cancer…
revere | May 23, 2008If you aren't in the business of figuring out if a chemical is a health hazard you might never have heard of the EPA's IRIS (Integrated Risk Information System) database but suffice it to say it is a wealth of valuable information on the topic. Considered authoritative by many states and countries, its judgements have become the basis for official standards. It's been around since the start of Reagan's second term (1985) so there is no claim it is some kind of fringe environmentalist fantasy. It's not the Last Word but it's a loud voice and taken seriously by anyone tasked with protecting the…
revere | April 29, 2008We've covered the FDA failure leading to their overlooking benzene in soda pretty often (at least if pretty often means here, here, here, here, here, here and here). It's like the guy who went to the doctor complaining of pain in his belly. "Ever have it before?" the doctor asked. "Yes, twice" the patient said. "Well, you have it again."
In this installment we learn that the benzene, a known human carcinogen, doesn't really have to be there. Recall how it got there. Two preservatives commonly added to soft drinks, ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) and sodium benzoate, react to produce the benzene…
revere | April 28, 2008On a couple of occasions (here, here) we've taken note of the scientific controversy regarding the plasticizer, bisphenol-A (BPA). I shouldn't really put it this way, because as the leading BPA researcher, Fred vom Saal of the Univeristy of Missouri said in the Washington Post over the weekend, there is no meaningful controversy any longer. Now that NIH's National Toxicology Program has finally presented its draft report on BPA expressing concern over possible carcinogenic and developmental effects, vom Saal's statement seems pertinent:
"The scientific community basically said, 'This argument…
revere | January 18, 2008Another story about a "new" screening test, this one for prostate cancer, the most common cancer in the US. This one looks for a particular combination of variations in five genes. If a man has all five and a family history of prostate cancer then his risk of is increased by a factor of nine. The researchers who have devised the test have also patented it and plan to sell it for $300 bucks a pop. I, for one, am not buying it (literally or figuratively). First some of the details as given by a press report:
Almost half of prostate cancer patients carry five genetic variations and a family…