Radon: the leading cause of cancer in people who don’t smoke

Being a lifelong health enthusiast, health educator and tness trainer — and married to a primary care physician — my family and I were blindsided by my Stage 3A lung cancer diagnosis in October of 2018. We were shocked as I had no respiratory symptoms and I have never smoked. My cancer was found incidentally while investigating what later turned out to be a benign ovarian cyst.

It wasn’t until my son, an environmental engineer, asked me if I had ever tested our home for radon when I learned that virtually anyone with lungs can get lung cancer and that radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer in the United States. It is the rst leading cause of lung cancer in people who don’t have a history of smoking.

Considering the risk for lung cancer is high, why aren’t people exposed to high radon levels eligible for lung cancer screening? e United States Preventive Services Task Force recommends people ages 50-80 with a 20-pack year history of smoking, or have quit in the past 15 years, get a low dose CT scan, which is painless and takes only a few minutes.

Based on the conversation with our son, we tested our home using methods recommended by the Environmental Protection Agency and discovered that the radon levels in our home were elevated above the threshold of 4 pico curies (pCi/L).

e EPA strongly advises that any radon level at or above 4 pCi/L should be reduced through a radon mitigation system. Radon mitigation needs to be done by professionally accredited operators and most health departments — including the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment — post lists of accredited mitigators.