The Pentagon said the new study was one of the largest and most comprehensive to date.Īn earlier study had looked at just Air Force pilots and had found some higher rates of cancer, while this one looked across all services and at both air and ground crews.Įven with the wider approach, the Pentagon cautioned that the actual number of cancer cases was likely to be even higher because of gaps in the data, which it said it would work to remedy. The data compared the service members with the general US population after adjusting for age, sex and race.

Both ground and air crews had far lower rates of lung cancer, and air crews also had lower rates of bladder and colon cancers. There was some good news reported as well. The overall rate for cancers of all types was 3 per cent higher. The study showed ground crews had a 19 per cent higher rate of brain and nervous system cancers, a 15 per cent higher rate of thyroid cancer and a 9 per cent higher rate of kidney or renal cancers, while women had a 7 per cent higher rate of breast cancer. Overall, the aircrews had a 24 per cent higher rate of cancer of all types. In its yearlong study of almost 900,000 service members who flew on or worked on military aircraft between 19, the Pentagon found that aircrew members had an 87 per cent higher rate of melanoma and a 39 per cent higher rate of thyroid cancer, while men had a 16 per cent higher rate of prostate cancer and women a 16 per cent higher rate of breast cancer.

Read | How Moderna’s experimental cancer vaccine works They were told that earlier military studies had found they were not at greater risk than the general US population. The data had long been sought by retired military aviators who have raised alarms for years about the number of air and ground crew members they knew who had cancer. A Pentagon study has found high rates of cancer among military pilots and for the first time has shown that ground crews who fuel, maintain and launch those aircraft are also getting sick.

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