The Health and Safety Executive is grossly under-estimating the real incidence of occupational cancer in the UK, a major new report suggests. The lead author of ‘Environmental and occupational causes of cancer: A review of recent scientific evidence,’ published this week by the Center for Sustainable Production at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, dismisses as ‘pointless’ and ‘counterproductive’ the 1981 estimates by Richard Doll and Richard Peto used by HSE to calculate occupational cancer numbers in the UK.

Richard Clapp, Genevieve Howe, Molly Jacobs Lefevre. Environmental and occupational causes of cancer: A review of recent Scientific literature. Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, University of Massachusetts Lowell, September 2005. News release, 19 September 2005, executive summary and full report [pdf].

The TUC is calling for the government to ‘be brave’, resist vested interest lobbying and seize the opportunity to ban smoking in all workplaces, including all pubs and clubs, by April 2006. In its submission to the government consultation on restricting smoking at work, which closed on 2 September, the TUC says anything other than a total ban would threaten the lives of hundreds of workers a year and the health of thousands more.

Risks 223.

New estimates say around 4,000 people will die from the effects of the 1986 accident at the Chernobyl reactor in the Ukraine, which sent a radioactive cloud across Europe. Most of the dead so far are emergency workers exposed immediately after the disaster. The new figures come in a report from the Chernobyl Forum, set up by a number of agencies including the IAEA, the World Health Organisation (WHO), a number of UN bodies and the governments of Belarus, the Russian Federation and the Ukraine to look at the impact of Chernobyl.

WHO news release, 5 September 2005 and Chernobyl webpages.

The 24-hour economy is placing women at an increased risk of breast cancer, a major study has warned. Researchers from Harvard University have established that regular night shifts increase the chance of developing the disease by as much as 50 per cent. The more night work that women do the higher the risk, says the study, which concludes that exposure to artificial lighting could be to blame.

Sarah P. Megdal, Candyce H Kroenke,Francine Laden, Eero Pukkala, Eva S Schernhamme, Night work and breast cancer risk: A systematic review and meta-analysis, European Journal of Cancer, volume 41, issue 13, pages 2023–2032, September 2005.

Occupational exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) markedly increases the risk of developing laryngeal cancer, according to new research. A study reported in the 1 September 2005 issue of the International Journal of Cancer examined data from 257 laryngeal cancer patients and 769 population controls to examine the possible role of occupational risk factors in the development of laryngeal cancer. Workers in road construction, painters, unskilled workers, paper mill workers, workers in the chemical industry, carpenters and bricklayers faced significantly higher risks of laryngeal cancer, the authors report. The paper concluded PAH exposure dramatically increased the risk of laryngeal cancer, up by 5.2 times.

Heiko Becher and others. Occupation, exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and laryngeal cancer risk, International Journal of Cancer, volume 116, issue 3, pages 451-457, September 2005.

More than 1 in 8 workers in France was exposed to workplace substances that can cause cancer, according to latest figures. An analysis of data from the SUMER survey 2003 indicates 2,370,000 workers, 13.5 per cent of the total French workforce, were exposed to one or more of a list of 28 workplace carcinogens in 2003. The figure was higher than estimates a decade earlier. Blue collar workers were more than eight times as likely to be exposed to a carcinogen at work, with 25 per cent exposed, compared to managers, with just 3 per cent exposed. Young and temporary workers were also at greater risk.

Risks 219.

Exposure to wood dust increases the chances of developing not only nasal cancer but also lung cancer, US research suggests. ‘Wood dust was designated as a human carcinogen based on increased sinus and nasal cancer rates among exposed workers,’ Dr George L Delclos and colleagues from the University of Texas, Houston report in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine. ‘However, data on an association with lung cancer have been inconclusive.’ In a study based on detailed personal interviews with 1,368 lung cancer patients and 1,192 cancer-free adults, the investigators found that the risk of lung cancer was three times higher for subjects involved in wood dust-related occupations and industries. For all categories of wood dust exposure, the risk was increased by 60 per cent compared with no exposure.

Carlos H Barcenas, George L Delclos, Randa El-Zein, Guillermo Tortolero-Luna, Lawrence W. Whitehead, Margaret R Spitz. Wood dust exposure and the association with lung cancer risk, American Journal of Industrial Medicine, volume 47, pages 349-357, 2005.

On the recommendation of the Industrial Injuries Advisory Council (IIAC), the government agreed to recognise as a prescribed industrial disease lung cancer in the absence of asbestosis where there is evidence of substantial asbestos exposure. The changes took effect from 6 April 2006.

Asbestos-Related Diseases, Cm 6553, IIAC, 14 July 2005.

Figures from the French national statistics office DARES published in 2005 revealed more than 1 in 8 workers was exposed to workplace substances that can cause cancer. The analysis of the 2003 SUMER survey indicated that 13.5 per cent of the total French workforce was exposed to one or more of a list of 28 workplace carcinogens. The figure was higher than estimates a decade earlier. Blue collar workers were eight times as likely to be at risk, with 25 per cent exposed. Eight products, all common in UK workplaces, contributed more than two-thirds of all exposures – mineral oils, three organic solvents, asbestos, wood dust, diesel exhaust fumes and crystalline silica.

Les expositions aux produits cancerogenes, Premiere Syntheses Informations, DARES, Number 28.1, 2005.

This groundbreaking study investigated cancer patients in three hospitals in an industrial suburb of Paris that has an unusually high incidence of cancers to identify those who had been exposed to occupational carcinogens. The authors also sought to assess the adequacy of the French system for their compensation and to develop priorities for prevention. In 2002–2003, 175 patients were interviewed, of whom 127 provided job histories. Of these, 74 per cent of the 107 men interviewed and 70 per cent of the 20 women interviewed were deemed likely to have occupational cancers, half of them following exposures to at least three different carcinogens. The network team prepared claims for the 26 patients whose cancers were potentially compensable. The majority were not eligible for compensation because of the limitations of the compensation system, rather than any question about causation. Of the 26 that fitted the compensation criteria, 21 – most of whom had cancers attributable to asbestos – received compensation. Suggestions for improving the system for compensation of occupational cancer victims in France were offered.

Annie Thebaud-Mony, Parvine Badouraly, Hania Ben Abdesselam and others. Occupational cancer in a Paris suburb: First results of a pro-active research project in Seine Saint-Denis, International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, volume 11, pages 263-275, 2005.