Cancer risk in workers exposed to oncogenic viruses

描述：在过去的50年里，队列死亡率研究一直是流行病学中评估不同行业职业性接触致癌物工人癌症风险的主要方法之一。事实证明，它们在检测工作场所中石棉、苯、苯胺染料等物质的致癌作用方面是有效和可靠的。这些研究也是流行病学证据的主要来源，这些证据表明这些药物对人类是致癌的。它们导致了监管行动，导致工作场所这种有害暴露的大幅减少，从而成功地保护了工人的健康。由于这些研究，现在的工作场所比30-50年前安全得多。然而，尽管这些研究已在不同的职业和工业组别中进行了大量的研究，但并没有关注鸡只屠宰/加工厂的工人。这些工人通常属于最低层 他们属于社会经济阶层，是工业中工资最低的个人，工资在法律允许的最低水平附近。除了这项拟议研究中收集的队列外，据我们所知，在队列研究中没有对这一职业组的癌症发生进行评估，尽管其他较弱设计的研究表明，他们在职业上患癌症的风险可能会增加。这一疏漏更加令人心酸，因为这些工人在工作中暴露在 某些病毒是已知的动物体内最强的致癌因子之一。在这项应用中，我们建议研究这组工人的癌症风险。这项研究不仅将调查接触这些病毒感染是否会对这些工人构成癌症危险(即癌症作为一种职业引起的传染病)，它还将提供关键证据，证明人类接触鸡的致癌病毒是否与发展为 癌症。传染病是国家职业安全与健康研究所在其职业安全与健康研究计划中确定的优先领域之一。

DESCRIPTION: For over the past 50 years, cohort mortality studies have been one of the main methods used in epidemiology for evaluating cancer risk in workers occupationally exposed to carcinogens in various industries. They have proven effective and reliable in detecting the carcinogenic effects of agents such as asbestos, benzene, aniline dyes, etc. in the workplace. These studies have also been the main sources of the epidemiologic evidence that these agents are carcinogenic in humans. They have led to regulatory actions that have resulted in the dramatic reduction of such harmful exposures in the workplace, hence succeeded in protecting workers' health. The workplace is much safer now than it was 30-50 years ago because of these studies. However, in spite of the fact that a large number of these studies have been conducted in various occupational and industrial groups, attention has not been paid to workers in chicken slaughtering/processing plants. These workers typically belong to the lowest socioeconomic stratum and are among the lowest paid individuals in industry, with wages around the minimum allowed by law. Apart from the cohorts assembled in this proposed study, to our knowledge this occupational group has not been evaluated for cancer occurrence in cohort studies, even though other studies of weaker designs have suggested they may be at increased risk of developing cancer occupationally. This omission is all the more poignant because these workers are exposed at work to certain viruses that are among the most potent cancer-causing agents known in animals. In this application we propose to study cancer risk in this group of workers. The study will not only investigate whether exposure to infections with these viruses present a cancer hazard to these workers (i.e. cancer as an occupationally-induced infectious disease), it will also provide critical evidence as to whether human exposure to the oncogenic viruses of chickens in general is associated with the development of cancer. Infectious diseases are one of the priority areas identified by the National Institute for Occupation Safety and Health in its Occupational Safety and Health Research program.