30 ms·
Five Nurses who work on the same floor at hospital have brain tumors
- d342d32d3d 2y agoShift work increases the cancer rate.
- SoftTalker 2y agoRandomness is clumpy
- Willingham 2y agoWow this is a profoundly unsettling and truthful fact, thanks for sharing.
- throwaway290 2y agoit also sneaks in a hideen assumption "cancer is random" in a way that tries to avoid a "citation needed". I hate those sorts of comments, worse than propaganda (at least that one obvious)
- OutOfHere 2y agoEven so, most of the times, when there is a clump, it's likely causal, not random.
- Solstinox 2y agoI suggest you go to random.org and play with the coin flipper or dice roller for a couple of hours. [edit] I just rolled 60 dice and got a string of 7 2’s in a row. Can someone calculate the odds of that happening for me?
- OutOfHere 2y agoRandomness can be clumpy, but clumpiness does not have to be random. Clumpiness is typically causal. Your experiment won't tell you what you need to know.
- throwaway290 2y ago"repeated number 2 out of 5 on a dice" vs. "repeated brain tumour out of infinite other things that can happen in dynamic system you don't even know all the parts" rly? run an RNG that doesn't quantize to an integer and see how many repeats you get then:)
- jjtheblunt 2y agoAnother example from a few years ago that extends back over time decades https://www.chicagomag.com/chicago-magazine/september-2018/cancer-cluster/ https://www.chicagomag.com/chicago-magazine/september-2018/c...
- dmix 2y agoInteresting. In that case six people had the same rare type of cancer which caused a settlement. The five nurses have three different kinds.
- SoftTalker 2y agoIt’s not cancer in TFA though. “The tumors, all benign, are three different types.” Sorry that just sounds random to me. I’m not disputing that there are literally toxic workplaces or environments that do correlate with cancer clusters.
- bluGill 2y agoNo reason to think this is anything other than normal stastical variation - at least at this time. not the same type of cancer even. when there are billions of people in the world it is expected that some where several get cancer at the same time.
- genter 2y agoI'm also curious if there's an increase of diagnosis because they work in a medical setting. Either they recognize the symptoms, or casual conversation with a doctor.
- defrost 2y agoThe article closes with that note. The American Cancer Society says that in order to meet the definition of a cancer cluster, occurrences must be the same type, in the same area, with the same cause, and affecting a number of people that's "greater than expected" when a baseline for occurrences is established. “Nearly 4 out of 10 people in the United States will develop cancer during their lifetimes," the society said on its cancer clusters webpage. "So, it’s not uncommon for several people in a relatively small area to develop cancer around the same time." The unstated numbers that matter here are many, how many people were thoroughly investigated here, was it the entire staff of the hospital (as many as a thousand, perhaps)? When X many people are thoroughly scanned how common is it for five people to have benign cancers that aren't doing anything, aren't growing, are just there? If (for example) twenty percent of the time 500 people were scanned, five at least had benign brain cancers, would this report be unusual or suspicious in itself?
- nickburns 2y agoDupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43594850 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43594850
- keepamovin 2y agoMany cancers are definitely caused by pathogenic vectors.
- bglazer 2y agoWhich ones?
- hobs 2y agoCervical cancer is an obvious one that comes to mind.
- chongli 2y agoAnd the cancer devastating the Tasmanian Devil [1]. It’s awful! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil_facial_tumour_disease?wprov=sfti1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil_facial_tumour_disease?wp... (content warning)
- keepamovin 2y agoYes. Many references for this topic, Google "evidence of pathogenic cause cancer". This one looks like a good read: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2950194625000524 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S295019462... "Role of infectious agents in cancer pathogenesis and therapy" for a dozen examples. There's so many more in reality.
- card_zero 2y agoEvolution is saving them, it seems. The ones that survive spread a tumor immunity gene. (Probably irrelevant as a strategy for nurses.)
- Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe 2y agoIt's not. It's just that their immunity is very tolerant to other members of their specie so having a cancer of the face in a specie that frequently bites each other in the face is transmissible. Afaik there is no pathogen involved.
- RONROC 2y agoJust a coincidence! Nothing to see here!
- zekenie 2y agoI’m surprised the hospital said they were confident it was safe. I wonder what gave them confidence? I’m struggling to think of what data I could have on hand that would convince me it was really safe. Also, to folks saying that randomness is clumpy… did you read the article? I think a bunch of nurses that notice they are all getting sick (and then FIVE of them getting brain tumors) should be taken quite seriously. I’d start with the assumption that there IS an environmental problem and then figure out what it is.
- linsomniac 2y ago>I wonder what gave them confidence? I'd guess it was their lawyers...
- giantg2 2y agoThey said there weren't any environmental factors. However, we don't know that much about brain cancers and the only real environmental factor would be radiation and some meds (like the mini pill). Checking the water supply is fine, I guess, but it takes years for the cancers to form (usually). Who knows if whatever they would look for would still be there. I think there's little chance of finding a new environmental factor. I think it's likely some unknown factors exist. I just don't think it's likely they'll find one this time.
- OutOfHere 2y agoNurses near pathology or surgical areas may be exposed to carcinogenic VOCs like formaldehyde, xylene, and toluene.
- janice1999 2y agoSimilar story: "More Than a Hundred Graduates of a Particular High School Got Rare Cancers" https://futurism.com/neoscope/high-school-classmates-rare-cancers https://futurism.com/neoscope/high-school-classmates-rare-ca...