https://nitter.click/Dr_A_Stein/status/2106082375595884665
A recent series of papers suggested that nuclear power plants are responsible for more than 100 thousand cancers. Using their method, every landmark we tested causes cancer,
Using the method specified in the papers, @econpragmatist and I found that every landmark we tested can be attributed to increases in cancer, most at much higher values than nuclear power. Harvard alone accounts for almost as many attributable deaths as all US nuclear power.
It turns out that the novel proximity method they used in the papers is the real reason for the results. The results are positive even with negative synthetic data.
They should have completed more internal testing and baselining before using it for published results.
Sophisticated statistics can produce extremely precise nonsense when the design fails to identify the causal mechanism.
https://www.breakthroughjournal.org/p/things-that-apparently-cause-cancer
Papers critiqued
- Residential proximity to nuclear power plants and cancer incidence in Massachusetts, USA (2000–2018)
- National analysis of cancer mortality and proximity to nuclear power plants in the United States
- 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
- Proximity to nuclear power plants and total mortality risk in the USA during 2000–2018
