From A national analysis of the impact of proximity to nuclear power plants on lung, breast and colon cancer mortalities in the U.S., 2000–2020 in the Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology [5.5 impact factor- good to strong for a science journal]

published yesterday:

Results

Proximity to nuclear power plants was associated with elevated mortality from breast, colon, and lung cancers. From 2000 to 2020, an estimated 39,767 female deaths (95% CI: 9312–69,381), representing 2.01% (95% CI: 0.47–3.50%), and 38,124 male deaths (95% CI: 16,106–59,600), representing 2.33% (95% CI: 0.98–3.64%), were attributable to this proximity. Lung cancer accounted for the largest burden in both sexes, followed by breast and colon cancer in females and colon cancer in males. Mortality risks declined with increasing distance, becoming negligible beyond 50 km.

Significance

This national-scale analysis provides new evidence that proximity to nuclear power plants is associated with increased mortality from major cancers in the U.S. The magnitude and consistency of the findings highlight the importance of updated risk assessments, sustained surveillance, and strengthened public health planning for communities living near nuclear facilities.

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-026-00922-2

Regulars here will have seen many reports of the risks of living near nuclear power stations. This latest is of particular significance because it comes from the USA.

Researchers based in the US, UK and France, countries where the nuclear industry is central to government energy strategies and serves their nuclear weapon-based defence systems, have rarely found significant risks of living near nuclear plants while those in Germany, which has neither, do find them.

This is clearly more cultural than scientific. Researchers in the US, UK and France depend for their careers on funds from the industry and/or from the government. They do not deliberately conceal risks which they have found, but rather ask questions and set parameters (distance, age etc) designed to minimise the risks that emerge.

One common strategy has been to look at cancer levels among all under 5’s rather than focus more carefully only on the new-born where the risk is far greater. Another is just to look at those living in concentric rings of varying distances around the plant rather than focusing only on those living very close to water courses into which cooling water flows or in areas downwind of the prevailing wind direction.

The particular risk of breast cancer in this new study reminds us of earlier research in Essex:

In March 2001, independent researchers, commissioned by local residents living near Bradwell nuclear power station in Essex, published Cancer Mortality and Proximity to Bradwell Nuclear Power Station in Essex, 1995-99; Preliminary results showing:

substantial excess mortality risks, particularly from breast cancer in women who had lived in wards adjacent to the river Blackwater. This finding was similar to the findings of earlier studies on coastal populations near the Irish Sea and near the Hinkley Point nuclear site in Somerset.

Source: chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://llrc.org/llrc/health/subtopic/bradrep5.pdf

Those findings were then rejected by local authority staff (Conservative-run council) adopting that same trick of burying the high levels of those living near the power station’s cooling water courses, in a larger scale population in a concentric circle around it. The first researchers returned to destroy the local authority’s credibility. Read about it here:

https://talkingupscotlandtwo.com/2025/06/10/lesson-for-opponents-of-nuclear-power-in-scotland-as-researchers-revisit-study-of-essex-nuclear-power-station-and-breast-cancer-incidence-among-mature-women-nearby-to-find-an-even-greater-risk-only-a/