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Pennsylvania Department of Health Studies
Two studies issued in 1991 by the Pennsylvania State Department of Health show no rise in cancer incidence among people living near the Three Mile Island nuclear plant. One study involved 31,000 people living within a five-mile radius of the plant. While 943 cases of cancer had been expected to have occurred among the group from 1982 to 1989, only 813 were recorded, the study showed.

The second study involved 5,292 women of childbearing age living within a 10-mile radius of the plant. Among this group, 36 cases of cancer had been expected; 35 were recorded. The state study found no association between radiation and cancer and no association between psychological stress and cancer.

TMI Health Fund Study
A study by researchers at Columbia University, released in 1990, found no association between the release of radiation during the 1979 Three Mile Island accident and leukemia, or childhood cancer in general. The study requested by public stakeholder groups near the plant and funded by the Three Mile Island Public Health Fund examined cancer incidence among 159,684 people living within 10 miles of the plant.

More than a dozen other major health studies have found no link between cancer and radiation released from TMI during the accident. The only health effect linked to the accident was stress.

Pilgrim Study
In 1990, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) published a study (the “Southeastern Massachusetts Health Study”) of leukemia incidence for 22 towns in the southeastern area of the state. The purpose of the study was to determine if the incidence of leukemia could be associated with exposure to radiation from the Pilgrim nuclear power plant. The population studied consisted of people aged 13 years and older who were diagnosed between 1978 and 1986 with any type of leukemia, excluding one type known not to be associated with radiation.

The report’s findings included the following:

• Individuals with the highest potential for exposure to radiation emissions from Pilgrim (i.e., those who lived and/or worked the longest and closest to the plant) had almost four times the incidence of leukemia as those having the lowest potential for exposure (i.e., those who lived and/or worked the least amount of time and farthest from the plant).
• The study found an association between radiation released from the Pilgrim plant and leukemia incidence only among those cases diagnosed before 1984.
• No apparent relationship with the plant was observed for cases diagnosed between 1984 and 1986.
  

A review of the study, released in October 1992, found serious problems with the study’s methods and conclusions. The 16-month-long analysis was the work of an independent review panel, composed of six experts in epidemiology, appointed by MDPH and Boston Edison Co., which owned the Pilgrim plant.

Among the most serious flaws in methodology, according to the panel, were the following:

• It was very inconsistent with other radiation studies. There was a large disparity between the number of excess leukemia cases reported by the study (47) and the number expected using data from other radiation studies (0.52).
• The study failed to document, from vital records, any excess leukemia deaths during the study period, compared with leukemia mortality before the Pilgrim plant opened.
• The study failed to include towns on Cape Cod that were within the study area.
• In estimating how much radiation exposure that people living near the plant received, the study should have used alternative models of how radiation is dispersed.
  

The panel called for “a carefully designed new study” to address the concerns raised in its report.