Health effects of residential radon: a European perspective at the end of 2002

Surveys of indoor radon concentrations, when taken together with estimates of the risk of lung cancer from studies in miners of uranium and other hard rocks, suggest that residential radon is responsible for many thousands of deaths from lung cancer each year in Europe. The vast majority of these deaths are likely to occur in individuals who also smoke cigarettes. Because of the skewed nature of the distribution of the indoor radon concentrations in most populations, most of the deaths will occur in individuals who are exposed at moderate rather than at very high radon concentrations. In order to enable appropriate policies to be developed for managing the consequences of exposure to radon, more reliable estimates of the risk of lung cancer resulting from it are needed. To achieve this, a European Collaborative Group on Residential Radon and Lung Cancer was initiated and its findings should be published in 2004.