Study finds no leukaemia link to UK nuclear plants.

A 35-year British scientific study has found no evidence that young children living near nuclear power plants have an increased risk of developing leukemia.

The research, conducted by scientists on the Committee of the Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment (COMARE) found only 20 cases of childhood leukemia within 5 km (3.1 miles) of nuclear power stations in the 35 years from 1969 to 2004.

Broadening the radius out to 25 km (15.5 miles), the scientists found only 430 cases of the disease in 35 years.

Both rates were virtually the same as in areas where there are no nuclear plants, they said, making the added risk "extremely small, if not zero."

"We've looked as best we can at the potential for radiation around nuclear power plants to cause leukemia and we've decided on the best evidence we have available that it is not the cause," Professor Alex Elliott, COMARE's chairman, told reporters in London.

Various studies have been conducted around the world into possible links between the risk of childhood blood cancers and living near nuclear plants. A study on Germany, published in 2007, did find a significantly increased risk.

The COMARE team said these findings were probably influenced by an unexplained leukemia cluster near a nuclear power plant in Krummel in northern Germany that lasted from 1990 to 2005.

Excluding Krummel, evidence for an increased leukemia risk among young children living close to German nuclear power plants was "extremely weak," it said.

"LOOK ELSEWHERE"

Elliot's report was the 14th from COMARE and covered 13 nuclear power plant sites across Britain.

He said that, while it would be sensible to keep a "watching brief" for links between nuclear plant radiation and leukemia, it would also be wise to look elsewhere for possible causes.

Leukemia is a cancer of immature white blood cells and usually occurs in children between 2 and 4 years old.

It is rare, affecting around 500 children a year in Britain, and experts say 85 to 90 percent of cases can now be cured.

Some scientists think childhood Leukemia may be linked to an infection of some sort, possibly a virus.

Recent studies have suggested that children whose families are poorer, or who are brought up in more crowded places, are less likely to develop the disease.

Asked if the COMARE findings had any implications for people living near Japan's Fukushima nuclear power plant, which was badly damaged in the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, or near the site of the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986, Elliot stressed that the British studies had looked only at nuclear power plants during normal operation.

"You can't extrapolate (from these findings) to a catastrophic situation," he said.

He added, however, that several United Nations reports had concluded there was no evidence of increased childhood Leukemia rates around the Chernobyl site.