Swedetown residents, worried that the nearby Petrochem/ Ekotek contamination site had spawned cancer-causing agents, were informed Thursday there is no link between the site and five cases of cancer there.
Researchers with the State Health Department's Bureau of Epidemiology studied the Utah Cancer Registry for cases in the vicinity of Swedetown, a residential pocket located south of the spill site, 1628 N. Chicago St.They found five incidents of cancer in Swedetown - including cases of lung, bladder and colorectal cancer in three elderly men, stomach cancer involving an elderly woman and a single case of breast cancer in a middle-age woman. Only one of the cases - bladder cancer - is associated with environmental exposure.
However, bladder cancer most often plagues elderly men, and such is the case in Swedetown.
"This is not an unexpected finding," said Kim Blindauer, risk assessment manager for the bureau. Also, "the cancers found in Swedetown were each different."
Blindauer agreed the study findings may be skewed because of data that is simply not available.
The study does not include cases involving residents who may have been exposed to the site, then moved away, perhaps to be later diagnosed outside Utah. The same philosophy applies for people who may have moved into the neighborhood with cancer, having been exposed to a site somewhere else.
Considering that cancer has a 10- to 20-year latency period in adults, the figures are only applicable for residents who may have been exposed to the site before 1980. Anything more recent would only start to show itself now, Blindauer said.
Overall, there is no evidence the contaminants at the Petrochem/ Ekotek site contributed in any way to the five cancer cases, Blindauer said.