《Association between Childhood Leukaemia and Exposure to Powerfrequency Magnetic Fields in Middle Europe》.pdfVIP

Biomed Environ Sci, 2012; 25(5): 597‐601  597 Letters Association between Childhood Leukaemia and Exposure to Power-frequency Magnetic Fields in Middle Europe 1,2 3 1 1 Vitezslav JIRIK , Ludek PEKAREK , Vladimir JANOUT , and Hana TOMASKOVA 1. Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ostrava, Czech Republic; 2. Department of Biophysics, Faculty of Science, Palacky University Olomouc, Czech Republic; 3. National Institute of Public Health, Prague, Czech Republic Abstract  Objective   Higher  levels  of  exposure  to  extremely  low‐frequency  magnetic  fields  (ELF‐MF)  are  associated with a slightly  increased  risk of childhood  leukaemia. Compared with  more‐developed  Western countries, higher exposure levels are evident in the Czech Republic, probably because of the  different types of housing. In light of this, we aimed to examine the association between ELF‐MF  exposure and childhood leukaemia in the Czech Republic.  Methods  We conducted a paired case‐control study. The cases (children with leukaemia) were age‐  sex‐ and permanent residence‐matched to controls (children without leukaemia). Although this limited  potential bias and confounding, it also limited our number of participants.  Results  The matched analyses included 79 case‐control pairs. No significant association between  ELF‐MF  exposure  and  childhood  leukaemia  was  observed for  exposures  over  0.2  µT  (odds  ratio  [OR]=0.93, confidence  interval  [CI]=0.45‐1.93), 0.3  µT  (OR=0.77, CI=0.34‐1.75), or 0.4  µT