An overview on the relationship between residential radon and lung cancer: what we know and future research.

We aim to provide an overview of the research available on indoor radon and lung cancer, with a special focus on Spanish investigations. Early studies on underground miners established the link between radon and lung cancer, which was later confirmed for the general population by residential case-control studies. Spain contributed with extensive evidence, including 5 multicentric, hospital-based, case-control studies in the last 30 years, exploring diverse aspects, such as radon's effect on never-smokers, molecular pathways linking radon exposure to lung cancer risk, survival rates, mortality burden, and occupational exposure. There is a well-established causal association between radon with lung cancer. Despite pioneering research performed in our country by the Galician Radon Laboratory, particularly on driver genes, the evidence on the potential molecular pathways which makes radon a carcinogen is sparse. Also, relevant questions on the potential association of radon exposure with the induction of other diseases are still pending.

[Attributable mortality to tobacco consumption in Brazil, 1996-2019]. / Mortalidad atribuida al consumo de tabaco en Brasil, 1996-2019.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the burden of tobacco consumption on mortality and years of life expectancy lost in population ≥35 years in Brazil in the period 1996-2019 and to identify trend changes in smoking-attributable mortality. METHOD: An independent prevalence method using the lung cancer mortality rate as a proxy for cumulative smoking risk was used to estimate smoking-attributable mortality. Smoking-attributable mortality is estimated from the lung cancer mortality rate and applying relative risks from 5 US cohorts. Smoking-attributable mortality, crude and standardized attributed mortality rates are presented overall, by sex, age and causes of death. Trend analysis was performed by applying joinpoint regression models. Years of life expectancy lost due to tobacco were calculated. RESULTS: Tobacco consumption caused 2,389,831 deaths in Brazil between 1996-2019. Cardiometabolic diseases were the leading cause of death in women throughout the period and in men until 2015. Since 2006, smoking-attributable mortality rates in men, regardless of age, show a decreasing trend while in females the evolution is different. The years of life expectancy lost show a slight decrease since the first triennia and are higher in men. CONCLUSIONS: In Brazil, the 8.5% of total mortality between 1996-2019 is attributed to tobacco consumption. It is important to monitor the burden of the tobacco consumption on mortality in order to strengthen or implement interventions against smoking in Brazil.