Mortality Among Rubber Workers I. White Male Union Employees in Akron, Ohio

Abstract

Mortality among a cohort of 13,571 white male rubber workers in Akron, Ohio is described. Mortality from all causes was 82% of that expected on the basis of death rates for US white males. Excess deaths from cancer (observed/expected numbers) in specific sites among workers in specific work areas include stomach:processing (18/9.9); large intestine: processing (14/10.5); lung: tire curing (20/12.4): bladder: all workers (48/39.5); brain: tire building (7/3.7): lymphatic: tire building (11/7.1): and leukemia: all workers (55/43.0). In general, excess cancer deaths occurred most often among men who started working between ages 35 and 44 and prior to 1935, who worked 25-34 years and were over age 74 at death, and who died after 1954.

Occupational Disease in the Rubber Industry

“…The mortality experience of approximately 25,000 past and current employees from one plant in Ohio going back to 1925 has been reviewed by Monson and Nakano (1,2 …”

Lung cancer case‐control study in a rubber manufacturing plant

“…Several previous studies of rubbers workers [Fox et al, 1974;Fox and Collier, 1976;McMichael et al, 1976a;Monson and Nakano, 1976;Mancuso, 19741 reported increased lung cancer risks among workers engaged in the compounding and mixing of raw rubber stocks and in the curing of green rubber products. The results of the present study do not support these findings.…”

Exposure Assessment to Preformed Environmental N-Nitroso Compounds from the Point of View of Our Own Studies

“…NMOR probably arises as a trace con taminant in bismorpholinecarbamylsulfenamide, which is used as an accelerator. It is of interest to note that several recent studies agree that lung and gastrointesti nal cancers occur at increased risk among workers in several of these same areas [Monson and Fine, 1978;Monson and Nakano, 1976;Mancuso, 1976 et al., 1976;McMichael et al, 1976;Andjelkovich et al, 1977], However, at this point further speculation on the possible involvement of N-nitroso compounds in the etiology of rubber worker cancer is premature. We know of two US epidemiology studies which are planning to investigate the nitrosamine-rubber worker link.…”