The Cancer Problem: A Statistical Study

Abstract

IT is well known that the incidence of cancerous diseases varies considerably in different districts and in different occupations. In this book Mr. Green has attempted to find some factor which will explain this difference in incidence, and he has critically examined the local distribution of cancer in different districts, particularly in Scotland, and the conditions which obtain in those districts. He finds that cancerous districts, as a rule, are particularly associated with the burning of coal as fuel, while in the non-cancerous ones wood or peat is the staple fuel. Thus in Nairn-shire, which has the highest mortality figure from cancer in Scotland, the cancer deaths for the last ten years are confined to a definite area, while the rest of the county (100 square miles) is entirely free, and in the cancerous area coal is entirely or partially used as fuel, while in the non-cancerous area peat is universally used. The same holds good for other parts of the country. Thus, in the Orkneys, which, as a whole, have a cancer mortality slightly above that for Scotland, Stenness has a cancer death-rate of 1 out of 42 from all causes and peat is the only fuel, while in Sanday, where coal alone is burned, the cancer death-rate is 1 out of 9 from all causes. A strange anomaly, however, was met with. In Birsay and in St. Andrews, in the Orkneys, the cancer mortality is practically as great as in Sanday, yet peat only is burned. Investigation showed that the peat used in these two districts is peculiar, being hard and stony and having a high content of sulphur like coal. From these and other facts the author concludes that a high sulphur content of the fuel is the factor correlating it with cancer. It must be admitted that the array of facts and figures produced by Mr. Green entirely favours his main proposition, and it is difficult to arrive at any other conclusion.

The Cancer Problem: A Statistical Study.

New edition. By C. E. Green. Pp. ix + 140. (Edinburgh and London: W. Green and Son, Ltd., 1917.)