Children, Cancer & The Environment

Children, Cancer & The Environment Main Page Common Causes The Most Common Cancers Protecting Your Children Q&A

Different types of childhood cancer are linked to different environmental factors, but three stand out: pesticides, solvents and radiation.

• Pesticides: There is scientific evidence for pesticides' role in some childhood cancers. For example, many pesticides that have been shown to cause cancer in laboratory animals are still being used. In addition, numerous studies show links between childhood cancer and the use of pesticides in the home or garden, at parents' jobs, and as flea control on pets. And many forms of childhood cancer have been linked to exposure to pesticides in children, their parents or both, including leukemia (the most common childhood cancer), brain tumors, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Wilms tumor, Ewing's sarcoma and soft tissue sarcoma.
  
  
• Solvents: Solvents have been linked to brain tumors and leukemia in children. The research has focused mostly on situations in which fathers or mothers are exposed at work. Many experts think that these associations may be due to effects of solvents on sperm or eggs, but others point out that people exposed to solvents on the job come home with residues on their clothes and even in their exhaled breath, which might harm fetuses or children. Solvents, like pesticides, are all around us. They are commonly found in paints, nonwater-based glues, degreasers, varnish strippers and gasoline.
  
  
• Radiation: Two forms of radiation have been studied in relation to cancer in children: ionizing radiation (the kind emitted by nuclear bombs, nuclear power plants and X-ray machines) and electromagnetic fields (EMFs, released from high-tension power lines, some home wiring and such household appliances as electric blankets, heating pads, toaster ovens, hair dryers and clock radios). Ionizing radiation penetrates the body and causes mutations in DNA. There is no controversy about its relation to cancer -- it is a known cause. EMFs do not penetrate the body, but can cause subtle biological effects. The evidence on whether EMFs are linked to childhood cancer is very contradictory and controversial, but there are a few studies that have tentatively linked this form of radiation to childhood leukemia and brain tumors.

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last revised 4.10.02