Autoren:	Russo, Antonello Blettner, Maria Merzenich, Hiltrud Wollschläger, Daniel Erdmann, Friederike Gianicolo, Emilio
Titel:	Incidence of childhood leukemia before and after shut down of nuclear power plants in Germany in 2011 : a population-based register study during 2004 to 2019
Online-Publikationsdatum:	10-Jan-2023
Erscheinungsdatum:	2023
Sprache des Dokuments:	Englisch
Zusammenfassung/Abstract:	The association between leukemia and proximity to nuclear-power-plants (NPPs) has been assessed in several countries with inconsistent results. A case-control study from Germany had shown an increased risk for childhood leukemia (diagnoses 1980-2003) near NPPs. Germany began shutting down nuclear reactors in 2011, following the Fukushima disaster. We tested whether the previously observed association between leukemia and proximity to NPP persisted despite the shutdown. We used an ecological study design to investigate the incidence of leukemia during 2004 to 2019 in children aged 0 to 14 years living near NPPs where at least one reactor was shut down in 2011. We defined study and control areas as municipalities whose surface area was at least 75% within 10 km or between 10 and 50 km of NPPs, respectively. We calculated age-standardized rates and incidence rate ratios (IRR) using control-areas as the reference. We also computed standardized incidence ratios (SIR) separately for each NPP using incidence rates of the German population as a reference. IRR decreased from 1.20 (95% confidence interval: 0.81-1.77) in 2004 to 2011 to 1.12 (0.75-1.68) in 2012 to 2019. Analyses of single plants showed an excess of childhood leukemia during 2004 to 2019 for the Unterweser-NPP, based only on three cases, and the Krümmel-NPP (n = 14; SIR: 1.98, 1.17-3.35). We found slightly decreasing of leukemia incidence rate ratios after the shutdown of nuclear reactors in 2011. Due to the small number of cases, risk estimates have large uncertainty. Further research including a longer follow-up is warranted. The consistent excess of incidence cases around Krümmel may require analytical epidemiological analysis.
DDC-Sachgruppe:	610 Medizin 610 Medical sciences
Veröffentlichende Institution:	Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
Organisationseinheit:	FB 04 Medizin
Veröffentlichungsort:	Mainz
ROR:	https://ror.org/023b0x485
DOI:	http://doi.org/10.25358/openscience-8544
Version:	Published version
Publikationstyp:	Zeitschriftenaufsatz
Nutzungsrechte:	CC BY-NC
Informationen zu den Nutzungsrechten:	https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Zeitschrift:	International journal of cancer 152 5
Seitenzahl oder Artikelnummer:	913 920
Verlag:	Wiley-Liss
Verlagsort:	Bognor Regis
Erscheinungsdatum:	2023
ISSN:	1097-0215
DOI der Originalveröffentlichung:	10.1002/ijc.34303
Enthalten in den Sammlungen:	DFG-491381577-H