Assessment of the Effectiveness of Radon Screening Programs in Reducing Lung Cancer Mortality

Fabien Gagnon, Mathieu Courchesne, Benoît Lévesque, Pierre Ayotte, Jean‐Marc Leclerc, Jean‐Claude Belles‐Isles, Claude Prévost and Jean‐Claude Dessau

Risk Analysis, 2008, vol. 28, issue 5, 1221-1230

Abstract: The present study was aimed at assessing the health consequences of the presence of radon in Quebec homes and the possible impact of various screening programs on lung cancer mortality. Lung cancer risk due to this radioactive gas was estimated according to the cancer risk model developed by the Sixth Committee on Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiations. Objective data on residential radon exposure, population mobility, and tobacco use in the study population were integrated into a Monte‐Carlo‐type model. Participation rates to radon screening programs were estimated from published data. According to the model used, approximately 10% of deaths due to lung cancer are attributable to residential radon exposure on a yearly basis in Quebec. In the long term, the promotion of a universal screening program would prevent less than one death/year on a province‐wide scale (0.8 case; IC 99%: –3.6 to 5.2 cases/year), for an overall reduction of 0.19% in radon‐related mortality. Reductions in mortality due to radon by (1) the implementation of a targeted screening program in the region with the highest concentrations, (2) the promotion of screening on a local basis with financial support, or (3) the realization of systematic investigations in primary and secondary schools would increase to 1%, 14%, and 16.4%, respectively, in the each of the populations targeted by these scenarios. Other than the battle against tobacco use, radon screening in public buildings thus currently appears as the most promising screening policy for reducing radon‐related lung cancer.

Date: 2008
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2008.01105.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:riskan:v:28:y:2008:i:5:p:1221-1230

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Risk Analysis from John Wiley & Sons
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().