Epidemiology Without Biology: False Paradigms, Unfounded Assumptions, and Specious Statistics in Radiation Science (with Commentaries by Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake and Christopher Busby and a Reply by the Authors)

There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

Abstract

Radiation science is dominated by a paradigm based on an assumption without empirical foundation. Known as the linear no-threshold (LNT) hypothesis, it holds that all ionizing radiation is harmful no matter how low the dose or dose rate. Epidemiological studies that claim to confirm LNT either neglect experimental and/or observational discoveries at the cellular, tissue, and organismal levels, or mention them only to distort or dismiss them. The appearance of validity in these studies rests on circular reasoning, cherry picking, faulty experimental design, and/or misleading inferences from weak statistical evidence. In contrast, studies based on biological discoveries demonstrate the reality of hormesis: the stimulation of biological responses that defend the organism against damage from environmental agents. Normal metabolic processes are far more damaging than all but the most extreme exposures to radiation. However, evolution has provided all extant plants and animals with defenses that repair such damage or remove the damaged cells, conferring on the organism even greater ability to defend against subsequent damage. Editors of medical journals now admit that perhaps half of the scientific literature may be untrue. Radiation science falls into that category. Belief in LNT informs the practice of radiology, radiation regulatory policies, and popular culture through the media. The result is mass radiophobia and harmful outcomes, including forced relocations of populations near nuclear power plant accidents, reluctance to avail oneself of needed medical imaging studies, and aversion to nuclear energy—all unwarranted and all harmful to millions of people.

Related collections

Most cited references 84

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Radiation exposure from CT scans in childhood and subsequent risk of leukaemia and brain tumours: a retrospective cohort study

Mark S. Pearce, Jane Salotti, Mark Little … (2012)

Summary Background Although CT scans are very useful clinically, potential cancer risks exist from associated ionising radiation, in particular for children who are more radiosensitive than adults. We aimed to assess the excess risk of leukaemia and brain tumours after CT scans in a cohort of children and young adults. Methods In our retrospective cohort study, we included patients without previous cancer diagnoses who were first examined with CT in National Health Service (NHS) centres in England, Wales, or Scotland (Great Britain) between 1985 and 2002, when they were younger than 22 years of age. We obtained data for cancer incidence, mortality, and loss to follow-up from the NHS Central Registry from Jan 1, 1985, to Dec 31, 2008. We estimated absorbed brain and red bone marrow doses per CT scan in mGy and assessed excess incidence of leukaemia and brain tumours cancer with Poisson relative risk models. To avoid inclusion of CT scans related to cancer diagnosis, follow-up for leukaemia began 2 years after the first CT and for brain tumours 5 years after the first CT. Findings During follow-up, 74 of 178 604 patients were diagnosed with leukaemia and 135 of 176 587 patients were diagnosed with brain tumours. We noted a positive association between radiation dose from CT scans and leukaemia (excess relative risk [ERR] per mGy 0·036, 95% CI 0·005–0·120; p=0·0097) and brain tumours (0·023, 0·010–0·049; p<0·0001). Compared with patients who received a dose of less than 5 mGy, the relative risk of leukaemia for patients who received a cumulative dose of at least 30 mGy (mean dose 51·13 mGy) was 3·18 (95% CI 1·46–6·94) and the relative risk of brain cancer for patients who received a cumulative dose of 50–74 mGy (mean dose 60·42 mGy) was 2·82 (1·33–6·03). Interpretation Use of CT scans in children to deliver cumulative doses of about 50 mGy might almost triple the risk of leukaemia and doses of about 60 mGy might triple the risk of brain cancer. Because these cancers are relatively rare, the cumulative absolute risks are small: in the 10 years after the first scan for patients younger than 10 years, one excess case of leukaemia and one excess case of brain tumour per 10 000 head CT scans is estimated to occur. Nevertheless, although clinical benefits should outweigh the small absolute risks, radiation doses from CT scans ought to be kept as low as possible and alternative procedures, which do not involve ionising radiation, should be considered if appropriate. Funding US National Cancer Institute and UK Department of Health.

0 comments Cited 722 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Cancer risk in 680 000 people exposed to computed tomography scans in childhood or adolescence: data linkage study of 11 million Australians

John D Mathews, Anna V Forsythe, Zoe Brady … (2013)

Objective To assess the cancer risk in children and adolescents following exposure to low dose ionising radiation from diagnostic computed tomography (CT) scans. Design Population based, cohort, data linkage study in Australia. Cohort members 10.9 million people identified from Australian Medicare records, aged 0-19 years on 1 January 1985 or born between 1 January 1985 and 31 December 2005; all exposures to CT scans funded by Medicare during 1985-2005 were identified for this cohort. Cancers diagnosed in cohort members up to 31 December 2007 were obtained through linkage to national cancer records. Main outcome Cancer incidence rates in individuals exposed to a CT scan more than one year before any cancer diagnosis, compared with cancer incidence rates in unexposed individuals. Results 60 674 cancers were recorded, including 3150 in 680 211 people exposed to a CT scan at least one year before any cancer diagnosis. The mean duration of follow-up after exposure was 9.5 years. Overall cancer incidence was 24% greater for exposed than for unexposed people, after accounting for age, sex, and year of birth (incidence rate ratio (IRR) 1.24 (95% confidence interval 1.20 to 1.29); P<0.001). We saw a dose-response relation, and the IRR increased by 0.16 (0.13 to 0.19) for each additional CT scan. The IRR was greater after exposure at younger ages (P<0.001 for trend). At 1-4, 5-9, 10-14, and 15 or more years since first exposure, IRRs were 1.35 (1.25 to 1.45), 1.25 (1.17 to 1.34), 1.14 (1.06 to 1.22), and 1.24 (1.14 to 1.34), respectively. The IRR increased significantly for many types of solid cancer (digestive organs, melanoma, soft tissue, female genital, urinary tract, brain, and thyroid); leukaemia, myelodysplasia, and some other lymphoid cancers. There was an excess of 608 cancers in people exposed to CT scans (147 brain, 356 other solid, 48 leukaemia or myelodysplasia, and 57 other lymphoid). The absolute excess incidence rate for all cancers combined was 9.38 per 100 000 person years at risk, as of 31 December 2007. The average effective radiation dose per scan was estimated as 4.5 mSv. Conclusions The increased incidence of cancer after CT scan exposure in this cohort was mostly due to irradiation. Because the cancer excess was still continuing at the end of follow-up, the eventual lifetime risk from CT scans cannot yet be determined. Radiation doses from contemporary CT scans are likely to be lower than those in 1985-2005, but some increase in cancer risk is still likely from current scans. Future CT scans should be limited to situations where there is a definite clinical indication, with every scan optimised to provide a diagnostic CT image at the lowest possible radiation dose.

0 comments Cited 439 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Estimated risks of radiation-induced fatal cancer from pediatric CT.

D. Brenner, C Elliston, E. Hall … (2001)

In light of the rapidly increasing frequency of pediatric CT examinations, the purpose of our study was to assess the lifetime cancer mortality risks attributable to radiation from pediatric CT. Organ doses as a function of age-at-diagnosis were estimated for common CT examinations, and estimated attributable lifetime cancer mortality risks (per unit dose) for different organ sites were applied. Standard models that assume a linear extrapolation of risks from intermediate to low doses were applied. On the basis of current standard practice, the same exposures (milliampere-seconds) were assumed, independent of age. The larger doses and increased lifetime radiation risks in children produce a sharp increase, relative to adults, in estimated risk from CT. Estimated lifetime cancer mortality risks attributable to the radiation exposure from a CT in a 1-year-old are 0.18% (abdominal) and 0.07% (head)-an order of magnitude higher than for adults-although those figures still represent a small increase in cancer mortality over the natrual background rate. In the United States, of approximately 600,000 abdominal and head CT examinations annually performed in children under the age of 15 years, a rough estimate is that 500 of these individuals might ultimately die from cancer attributable to the CT radiation. The best available risk estimates suggest that pediatric CT will result in significantly increased lifetime radiation risk over adult CT, both because of the increased dose per milliampere-second, and the increased lifetime risk per unit dose. Lower milliampere-second settings can be used for children without significant loss of information. Although the risk-benefit balance is still strongly tilted toward benefit, because the frequency of pediatric CT examinations is rapidly increasing, estimates that quantitative lifetime radiation risks for children undergoing CT are not negligible may stimulate more active reduction of CT exposure settings in pediatric patients.

0 comments Cited 409 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

All references

Author and article information

Contributors

Bill Sacks: wsacks@cox.net

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Biol Theory

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Biol Theory

Title: Biological Theory

Publisher: Springer Netherlands (Dordrecht )

ISSN (Print): 1555-5542

ISSN (Electronic): 1555-5550

Publication date (Electronic): 17 June 2016

Publication date PMC-release: 17 June 2016

Publication date (Print): 2016

Volume: 11

Pages: 69-101

Affiliations

[ ]Center for Devices and Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Green Valley, AZ USA

[ ]Department of English, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, Greensboro, NC USA

[ ]Nuclear Physics Enterprises, Marlton, NJ USA

Article

Publisher ID: 244

DOI: 10.1007/s13752-016-0244-4

PMC ID: 4917595

PubMed ID: 27398078

SO-VID: 4bd5a37d-b362-4154-8a84-0243517d3dc4

License:

Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

History

Date received : 8 January 2016

Date accepted : 7 April 2016

Custom metadata

ScienceOpen disciplines: Comparative biology

Keywords: adaptive response,biology,hormesis,linear no-threshold,paradigm,radiation,radiophobia

Data availability:

ScienceOpen disciplines: Comparative biology

Keywords: adaptive response, biology, hormesis, linear no-threshold, paradigm, radiation, radiophobia

Epidemiology Without Biology: False Paradigms, Unfounded Assumptions, and Specious Statistics in Radiation Science (with Commentaries by Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake and Christopher Busby and a Reply by the Authors)

Read this article at

Abstract

Related collections

Evolutionary Cell Biology

Most cited references 84

Radiation exposure from CT scans in childhood and subsequent risk of leukaemia and brain tumours: a retrospective cohort study

Cancer risk in 680 000 people exposed to computed tomography scans in childhood or adolescence: data linkage study of 11 million Australians

Estimated risks of radiation-induced fatal cancer from pediatric CT.

Author and article information

Contributors

Journal

Affiliations

Article

History

Categories

Custom metadata

Comments

Comment on this article

Similar content 23

Cited by 32

Most referenced authors 597