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Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

nytimes.com

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Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#241

Post by jchw »

ragingroosevelt wrote: post #221
jchw wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a brick house and a basement, and I have no radon mitigation system, and I live in an area where radon is generally a concern (southeast Michigan.) Over the last couple years I've had some AirThings sensors collecting data. Last month: - The one-day average radon concentration detected by the basement sensor crossed over 3 pCi/L once... for a very brief period. Around 80% of the time, the one-day average radon…

My understanding is that a radon reading of 2 is the upper bound for reasonable regular exposure. If you're seeing above that, I'd be inclined to look into mitigation.

I'm not an expert but I've read enough to know this is not a serious concern. If you were to see a reading above 2.6 pCi/L from a one-time test, that would be more concerning, but what I'm actually seeing is occasional jumps above 2.6 pCi/L that last less than a day from continuous monitoring. We're talking events that last on the order of hours for a few days a year... I can open a damn window. The vendor for my sensor recommends taking action if the level is above 4 pCi/L for an entire month, but for me it's barely above 2.6 pCi/L at all. In some months neither sensor ever gets above that.

I think on the contrary if you have a tendency to worry too much things like continuous monitoring systems might not be the best thing for your mental health. I actually was pretty worried since I'm a mild hypochondriac and a friend told me that they got obsessed with CO2 monitoring after getting one. Thankfully for me it has mostly been an occasional curiosity since there's nothing too concerning.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#242

Post by blueflow »

dinfinity wrote: post #58
phkahler wrote: post #17

Are lung cancer rates up? Obviously eliminating or reducing the primary cause will lead to larger percentages of the other causes among cases.

Yes, also, the base rate of smoking in different groups is important to take into consideration to prevent the base rate fallacy. Very few Chinese American women smoke (~2%), so if smokers and non-smokers have the same chance of getting lung cancer not caused by smoking , then the number of non-smokers with lung cancer will be a larger proportion. If 100% of some group would be non-smokers, then obviously 100% of lun…

> It's similar to misinterpreting the fact that most people that were hospitalized from Covid-19 were vaccinated.

Whats the correct interpretation of this?

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#243

Post by xnorswap »

Quarrel wrote: post #228
owenversteeg wrote: post #168

I think a large contributor is poor indoor air quality - of all types, not just one specific pollutant - causing inflammation and thus cancer. Homes have gotten far tighter in recent years, and people buy ever more cheap furniture and inexpensive consumer products. So you have formaldehyde and other VOCs off-gassing, you have plasticizer vapors, nanoplastics in the air from synthetic furniture and cloth, you have ref…

Why do you think this? There is an entire article linked here, saying that they, Scientists, don't know what the causes are, even though they're actively trying to search for a cause.

HN can be infuriating sometimes.

Imagine if there was an environmental science forum that sat around pontificating with mistrust about software performance. Chances are people would mock it and marvel at their ignorance.

But here we have a forum of (largely) software developers looking at the experts on environmental health and going, "Why are they so stupid? It's obviously ".

It's not limited to environmental health, it affects all kinds of articles on social sciences. Commentary full of people who aren't domain experts wondering why the domain experts are all so clueless because Mr Software Engineer has it all figured out.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#244

Post by jgalt212 »

zamadatix wrote: post #96
Waterluvian wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difficult thing for me is that while I believe radon can cause lung cancer, I think products are often sold based on fear. “Second leading cause” doesn’t really mean anything in isolation, does it? What slice of my mortality pie was radon before and after spending $5000? Could I spend $5000 to cut a bigger slice out of it in another way, like eating better or hiring a grizzly bear to make me exercise more often?…

For 93% of people the only cost is the $15 test kit to verify "yep, don't need to even think about it". For the other 7% that then need to really do a cost-benefit the data is out there but you do need to go through your specific circumstances to get a meaningful number. The risk levels vary vastly (orders of magnitudes) between both the radon level and your life choices/situation, so it's relatively meaningless to s…

Has anyone ever done a meaningful cost benefit analysis for less than $15?

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#245

Post by wvh »

Waterluvian wrote: post #86
irrational wrote: post #80

The second leading cause of lung cancer is radon. My high schooler came home and said her science teacher said everyone should do a radon test. I scoffed, but humored her by getting a kit from Home Depot and sending it away to a lab. The results came back very high. So I purchased an electronic radon monitor and it showed almost the exact same results. Well, crap. I installed a radon mitigation system and now the num…

The difficult thing for me is that while I believe radon can cause lung cancer, I think products are often sold based on fear. “Second leading cause” doesn’t really mean anything in isolation, does it? What slice of my mortality pie was radon before and after spending $5000? Could I spend $5000 to cut a bigger slice out of it in another way, like eating better or hiring a grizzly bear to make me exercise more often?…

I reckon grizzly bears have negative health side effects too... It's all a fine balancing act.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#246

Post by llm_nerd »

phkahler wrote: post #17

Are lung cancer rates up? Obviously eliminating or reducing the primary cause will lead to larger percentages of the other causes among cases.

>Are lung cancer rates up?

Incidence rates have been steadily dropping, in many areas by over 50% from 1990. Mortality rates have fallen faster still.

So yes, it isn't that other things picked up, but that as smoking has become a fringe other causes proportion naturally increases.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#248

Post by piombisallow »

skeezyboy wrote: post #222
elric wrote: post #195

Give it a few more years, vapes will boost those numbers again. I wish I was joking. But I'm not. I'm seeing 12 year olds with vapes quite regularly. They're so addicted, taking sneaky hits on the bus or on the train. Even when smoking was cool back when I was a kid, I didn't know of anyone that young who was that addicted.

overlooked fact i point out is that the carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke makes you nauseas and puts an upper bound on your possible hourly intake of nicotine, whereas vapes dont contain the CO, and actually taste good enough to drink... you end up taking magnitudes more nicotine than the traditional route

Nicotine by itself doesn't cause cancer.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#249

Post by TuringNYC »

dathinab wrote: post #227
devjab wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Radon gas is a pretty big thing in construction where I live since our underground is mainly boulder clay (which apparently has or leaks or whatever a lot of radon gas). Anyway, In Denmark a little over 5000 get lung cancer every year, and 300 of thouse are from radon gas. Acording to our Kræftens Bekæmpelse (anti-cancer NGO) there may be an additional 25% risk of radon causing lung cancer if you smoke. Since around…

> and you can reduce it to basically 0% for little money. which is why I'm confused by people second questioning how bad it actually is in context of _fixing_ it (not in context of a national health scope) if there is something which is known to be quite unhealthy in a non small degree, and there is a cheap fix why wouldn't you just fix it. In the end if it's very bad, or slightly less bad or the 10th leading cause i…

I found most people dont know about this or think about this until there is a home purchase and home inspection -- that is when it is revealed, and typically when it is remediated as part of the purchase contingencies. If youre living in the same home for a while, you wouldnt typically know. Also, if you are a renter, you probably wont know and the landlord will probably purposefully not want to test.

In my state, the state forces some of these tests (e.g., smoke detector) as part of the sales process so at least there is some hook for testing.

Re: Many lung cancers are now in nonsmokers

#250

Post by bityard »

kelnos wrote: post #231
dathinab wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and you can reduce it to basically 0% for little money. which is why I'm confused by people second questioning how bad it actually is in context of _fixing_ it (not in context of a national health scope) if there is something which is known to be quite unhealthy in a non small degree, and there is a cheap fix why wouldn't you just fix it. In the end if it's very bad, or slightly less bad or the 10th leading cause i…

Is radon mitigation affordable, though? Someone in another subthread said they got quotes between $1600 and $3000. Even the low end of that is a difficult amount to spend for a lot of people in the US. If they're going to spend it (if they even can ), they're going to want to know it's going to meaningfully decrease their risk of cancer. I'm not saying it's not worth it -- that's the point, I don't know -- but I agre…

I don't know where you live but where I live in the Midwestern suburbs, $3k is on the low end for almost any significant home improvement/repair project except maybe repainting a room.
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