WASHINGTON (AP) — A Pentagon study found high cancer rates among military pilots and, for the first time, showed that the ground crews who fuel, maintain and launch those planes are also getting sick.
Retired military aviators who have long requested this data have sounded the alarm for years about the number of air and ground crew members who knew they had cancer. They were told that previous military studies had found that they were no more at risk than the country’s general population.
In its year-long study of nearly 900,000 service members who flew or worked on military aircraft between 1992 and 2017, the Pentagon found that aircrew members had an 87% higher rate of melanoma and a 39% higher rate of cancer. while men had a 16% higher rate of prostate cancer and women a 16% higher rate of breast cancer. Overall, aircrew had a 24% higher rate of cancer of all types.
The study showed that ground crews had a 19% higher rate of brain and nervous system cancer, a 15% higher rate of thyroid cancer, and 9% higher rates of liver or kidney cancer, while women had 7% higher rates of cancer. more likely to get breast cancer. The overall rate of cancers of all types was 3% higher.
In contrast, both ground and aircrew had much lower rates of lung cancer, and aircrew also had lower rates of bladder and colon cancer.
The study was requested by Congress under the 2021 defense bill. Now, because higher rates have been found, the Pentagon must conduct an even bigger review to try to understand why aircrews are getting sick.
