Pilots and flight attendants show highest radiation-related cancer death rates in Harvard study

BOSTON - Airline pilots and flight attendants had the highest rates of death linked to radiation-related cancers among more than 500 U.S. occupations, according to a Harvard study covered by Fox News.

Researchers led by Anupam B. Jena, M.D., Ph.D., reviewed nearly 13 million death certificates from the National Vital Statistics System for 2020 through 2024. About 14,000 of those records were pilots and 7,000 were flight attendants.

They tracked mortality from cancers often tied to ionizing radiation, including breast cancer, melanoma, leukemia (except chronic lymphocytic leukemia), lymphoma, central nervous system cancers, thyroid cancer, prostate cancer, and non-melanoma skin cancers. Lung cancer was left out to avoid mixing results with smoking risk.

Pilots and flight attendants showed statistically higher death rates linked to breast cancer, central nervous system cancers, prostate cancers, and melanoma. Pilots were also more likely to die from leukemia. Among flight attendant deaths, 6.9 percent were linked to radiation-related cancers, and 6.7 percent of pilot deaths were, higher than any other occupation group studied.

For cancers not related to radiation, rates looked similar to other jobs. Jena told Fox News Digital that cosmic radiation from the sun increases as people fly higher in the atmosphere. CDC figures cited in the story put annual cosmic radiation for airline workers at about 3 to 6 millisieverts, versus about 0.4 millisieverts for someone taking 10 round-trip cross-country flights.

The study appeared Aug. 17 in JAMA Internal Medicine. Jena said the risk increase is meaningful for the groups as a whole and that earlier or more regular screening is worth discussing. The work does not prove every individual crew member will develop cancer, and it cannot separate every lifestyle factor. It does raise a clear occupational signal for people who spend careers at altitude.