Johns Hopkins University researchers are fresh out with a “fracked natural gas will give you cancer from radon” study. In the latest attack on fracking, published in Environmental Health Pespectives and titled “Predictors of Indoor Radon Concentrations in Pennsylvania, 1989–2013” (full copy below), Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers rather simplistically say that levels of radon in Pennsylvania homes have been going up since 2004–when the first Marcellus Shale well was drilled in the state and the likely source is Marcellus Shale wells. They say prior to 2004, levels of radon in PA homes was pretty much steady-state–that it did not increase. Since the “big thing” that’s happened over the past decade is a lot of Marcellus drilling, voilà, must be those nasty frackers are the source. They also notice that homes closer to fracked shale wells have higher concentrations of radon than homes not close to fracked shale wells. We’re fully in favor of public health research–we just wish it was a little more rigorous than what passes for research at the anti-drilling Johns Hopkins…
