Workers' Compensation: CDC - NIOSH Update - NIOSH Study of Firefighters Finds Increased Rates of Cancer

Monday, October 28, 2013

Today's post was shared by WCBlog and comes from www.cdc.gov

A combined population of 30,000 firefighters from three large cities had higher rates of several types of cancers, and of all cancers combined, than the U.S. population as a whole, researchers from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and colleagues found in a new study.
The new findings are generally consistent with the results of several previous, smaller studies. Because the new study had a larger study population followed for a longer period of time, the results strengthen the scientific evidence for a relation between firefighting and cancer, the researchers said.
The findings were reported in an article posted on-line on Oct. 14, 2013, by the peer-reviewed journal Occupational and Environmental Medicine. The article is available online at http://oem.bmj.com/content/early/2013/10/14/oemed-2013-101662.full .
The researchers found that:

Cancers of the respiratory, digestive, and urinary systems accounted mostly for the higher rates of cancer seen in the study population. The higher rates suggest that firefighters are more likely to develop those cancers.
The population of firefighters in the study had a rate of mesothelioma two times greater than the rate in the U.S. population as a whole. This was the first study ever to identify an excess of mesothelioma in U.S. firefighters. The researchers said it was likely that the findings were associated with exposure to asbestos, a...