When my father was in late grade school, he developed some sort of a problem with his pituitary gland, the result of which was that he basically stopped developing physically and mentally, and caused him to begin gaining weight. I'm not sure exactly what the nature of the problem was, as he was never told, but he does recall that he was treated with shots of a substance "made from horses" (what, I have no idea. Growth hormones, maybe?), which took care of the problem, and he then developed normally.
The other day he mentioned that there were two other kids in his town (pop 350-450 at the time) about his age who developed the same problem. None of the them were related to each other.
I'm guessing that there is some sort of common root cause, as it seems unlikely that three unrelated children in such a small population would develop the same condition spontaneously. Perhaps some kind of pesticide, herbicide, or fertilizer used in the midwest during the 30s and early 40s? There was no industry at all in the area at that time, so if it's pollution it pretty much has to be agricultural.
I'd be interested in looking at a series of maps that would show incidences of either fatal or chronic illnesses over time for the state of Kansas. I'm curious both to see if there were other instances of this particular problem, and to see if Belpre had a higher than average cancer rate.
Any idea where I could find resources that would be of help?
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
I hope mauibabe can help you out. You might try the American Cancer Society, although I don't know if they keep statistical data for cancer rates. They might.
I know that my home county had a pretty high cancer rate, though I've long since forgotten the exact numbers. In this case, the oil refinery is the most likely source, even though it has been mothballed for a long time.
Good luck. Posted by maui babe (Member # 1894) on :
I can't find anything that general. All of the registries I've found have been for specific chronic illnesses like diabetes or cancer.
The Kansas department of health has this website that has cancer prevalence information as far back as 1997. According to this data, the cancer rate for Edwards County, Kansas is about 640 per 100,000 people for the last 10 years, although it has increased from 603 to 725 in that time.
I'm not sure how these numbers relate to the rest of the state/country (I work mostly with communicable diseases, not chronic stuff) or if this is what you're looking for, but it's what I was able to come up with quickly.
Posted by aspectre (Member # 2222) on :
Given that a successful (hormone) treatment was available before HumanGrowthHormone&etc were synthesized... Insecticides and herbicides boosted by nitrogen fertilizer :: endocrine disruption and hypothyroidism in children.
Also of interest is the recently found link between exposure to insecticides and Parkinson's.
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