February 17, 2003
Cancer: Tungsten trouble

An unprecedented federal probe into leukemia

By STEVE FRIESS

Carinsa Rivers had never heard of tungsten until last year. But now the element’s the focus of an unprecedented federal probe into why leukemia struck her daughter and 15 other children—killing three—between 1997 and 2002 in the rural Fallon, Nev., region, with a population of just 26,000.

TUNGSTEN—A HEAVY metal used to strengthen steel—has never been tied to cancer, but the National Institutes of Health will now start researching it for possible carcinogenic properties. A recent U.S. Centers for Disease Control study found the average level of tungsten in 205 Fallon residents was more than 12 times the national average, possibly reflecting “a unique environmental exposure,” CDC lead investigator Carol Rubin says.

In coming weeks, Rubin’s team will analyze urine in two similar rural Nevada communities to see if Fallon’s tungsten levels are unusual to Nevada, where tungsten was mined extensively for decades. And the National Center for Environmental Health will launch its first genetics study of a cancer cluster to compare the DNA of Fallon’s sick and healthy for clues to whether the ill children were predisposed to reactions to tungsten, arsenic and other metals found at elevated levels in the community.

But an environmental consulting firm hired by Fallon has dismissed the tungsten theory outright, insisting there’s no evidence it’s toxic. And other critics dismiss community cancer-cluster probes in general on the ground that they rarely unearth a smoking gun because there are too many factors at work. Such thinking infuriates parents like Rivers. “This town is too small and the cluster is too big for it to be just a coincidence,” she says. “They can’t ever stop looking.”

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