Prevention By Numbers

摘要

The locals call it 'Cancer Alley'-a sweltering stretch of the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to New Orleans, where more than a hundred chemical plants and oil refineries share a home with some of poorest people in the United States. In truth, no one has proved a link between the local industry and the few, sporadic reports of rare-cancer clusters along Cancer Alley. But the regions bad reputation is well deserved: the state of Louisiana has a major cancer problem. In 2005, the state had 214.9 cancer deaths for every 100,000 people, second only to Kentucky in the United States; the national average is 184.1.