Effect of mustard gas exposure on incidence of lung cancer: a longitudinal study

Sulfur mustard, an agent used in chemical warfare, is an alkylating substance with carcinogenic potential. However, the precise long-term carcinogenic effects of mustard gas are unclear. Since 1952, the authors have conducted health surveys of former workers who were employed from 1929 to 1945 in a poisonous gas factory in Okuno-jima, Hiroshima, Japan. This prospective study was undertaken from 1952 to 2005 to examine the incidence of lung cancer among the workers who were exposed to mustard gas (n=480), lewisite (n=55), and/or diphenylcyanarsine (n=178), as well as the incidence among unexposed workers (n=969). The stochastic relation between exposure and lung cancer was explored on the basis of multistage carcinogenesis by using an accelerated hazard model with a transformed age scale. Mustard gas exposure was found to transform the age scale for developing lung cancer. One year of exposure in subjects ≤18 or >18 years old at first exposure shifted the age scale down by 4.9 years and 3.3 years, respectively. On the basis of the long-term follow-up of former workers in the poisonous gas factory, the authors concluded that sulfur mustard decreased the age at which people were at risk of developing lung cancer and that the effect declined with aging.