Cookies help us run our site more efficiently.

By clicking “Accept”, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. View our Privacy Policy for more information or to customize your cookie preferences.

Accept Deny

GoGreenNation news

Air, Light Pollution Increase Risk Of Thyroid Cancer In Children

News Feed
Friday, April 18, 2025

By Dennis Thompson HealthDay ReporterFRIDAY, April 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- Babies exposed to air and light pollution have a higher risk of developing childhood thyroid cancer, a new study says.Airborne particle pollution and outdoor artificial light both increased babies’ risk of developing thyroid cancer before they turned 20, researchers recently reported in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.“These results are concerning, especially given how widespread both of these exposures are,” lead researcher Nicole Deziel, an environmental epidemiologist at the Yale School of Public Health, said in a news release.“Fine particulate matter is found in urban air pollution due to automobile traffic and industrial activity, and artificial light at night is common, particularly in densely populated urban areas,” she added.Both fine particle pollution and light pollution are considered environmental carcinogens that disrupt the body’s endocrine system, including thyroid function, researchers said in background notes.Particle pollution pose a threat because they’re small enough to enter the bloodstream. The airborne particles can be smaller than 2.5 micrometers, while a human hair is 50 to 70 micrometers wide, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).And outdoor artificial light can suppress melatonin and alter a person’s sleep/wake rhythm, which also influences hormone-regulated cancers, researchers said.For the study, researchers compared data from 736 young people diagnosed with thyroid cancer before age 20 with that from 36,800 healthy kids, all of whom hail from California.The team assessed the cancer patients’ exposure to air and light pollution based on their families’ home address when they were born.Results showed that for every 10 micrograms per cubic meter increase in particle pollution, a child’s odds of developing thyroid cancer rose by 7% overall.The strongest associations between air pollution and thyroid cancer were found among 15- to 19-year-olds (8% increased risk) and Hispanic children (13% increased risk), researchers said.Likewise, children born in areas with high levels of outdoor artificial light were as much as 25% more likely to develop thyroid cancer."Thyroid cancer is among the fastest growing cancers among children and adolescents, yet we know very little about what causes it in this population," Deziel said."Our study is the first large-scale investigation to suggest that these exposures early in life — specifically to PM2.5 and outdoor light at night — may play a role in this concerning trend,” she added.Compared to adults, children are often diagnosed with thyroid cancer at more advanced stages, with larger and harder-to-treat tumors, researchers said.Even if kids survive thyroid cancer, they can suffer aftereffects like headaches, physical disabilities and mental fatigue that will haunt them throughout their lives, researchers said.Researchers emphasized that more work is needed to replicate and validate their findings.“In the meantime,” Deziel noted, “our results point to the critical importance of addressing environmental factors in childhood cancer research. Reducing exposures to air pollution and managing light pollution could be important steps in protecting children's health.”SOURCE: Yale School of Public Health, news release, April 15, 2025Copyright © 2025 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

By Dennis Thompson HealthDay ReporterFRIDAY, April 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- Babies exposed to air and light pollution have a higher risk of...

By Dennis Thompson HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, April 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) -- Babies exposed to air and light pollution have a higher risk of developing childhood thyroid cancer, a new study says.

Airborne particle pollution and outdoor artificial light both increased babies’ risk of developing thyroid cancer before they turned 20, researchers recently reported in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.

“These results are concerning, especially given how widespread both of these exposures are,” lead researcher Nicole Deziel, an environmental epidemiologist at the Yale School of Public Health, said in a news release.

“Fine particulate matter is found in urban air pollution due to automobile traffic and industrial activity, and artificial light at night is common, particularly in densely populated urban areas,” she added.

Both fine particle pollution and light pollution are considered environmental carcinogens that disrupt the body’s endocrine system, including thyroid function, researchers said in background notes.

Particle pollution pose a threat because they’re small enough to enter the bloodstream. The airborne particles can be smaller than 2.5 micrometers, while a human hair is 50 to 70 micrometers wide, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

And outdoor artificial light can suppress melatonin and alter a person’s sleep/wake rhythm, which also influences hormone-regulated cancers, researchers said.

For the study, researchers compared data from 736 young people diagnosed with thyroid cancer before age 20 with that from 36,800 healthy kids, all of whom hail from California.

The team assessed the cancer patients’ exposure to air and light pollution based on their families’ home address when they were born.

Results showed that for every 10 micrograms per cubic meter increase in particle pollution, a child’s odds of developing thyroid cancer rose by 7% overall.

The strongest associations between air pollution and thyroid cancer were found among 15- to 19-year-olds (8% increased risk) and Hispanic children (13% increased risk), researchers said.

Likewise, children born in areas with high levels of outdoor artificial light were as much as 25% more likely to develop thyroid cancer.

"Thyroid cancer is among the fastest growing cancers among children and adolescents, yet we know very little about what causes it in this population," Deziel said.

"Our study is the first large-scale investigation to suggest that these exposures early in life — specifically to PM2.5 and outdoor light at night — may play a role in this concerning trend,” she added.

Compared to adults, children are often diagnosed with thyroid cancer at more advanced stages, with larger and harder-to-treat tumors, researchers said.

Even if kids survive thyroid cancer, they can suffer aftereffects like headaches, physical disabilities and mental fatigue that will haunt them throughout their lives, researchers said.

Researchers emphasized that more work is needed to replicate and validate their findings.

“In the meantime,” Deziel noted, “our results point to the critical importance of addressing environmental factors in childhood cancer research. Reducing exposures to air pollution and managing light pollution could be important steps in protecting children's health.”

SOURCE: Yale School of Public Health, news release, April 15, 2025

Copyright © 2025 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

Related News

What Trump’s Venezuela strategy means for Black communities

Environmental justice advocates warn that refining Venezuelan oil will concentrate more pollution and cancer risk in majority-Black communities along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast.

Environmental justice advocates warn that refining Venezuelan oil will concentrate more pollution and cancer risk in majority-Black communities along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast.

Pollution
Water

Plastics crisis intrudes on paradise

An environmental photojournalist documents the staggering scale of plastic pollution in Bali, where trash-clogged beaches and a massive landfill reveal the hidden cost of tourism.

An environmental photojournalist documents the staggering scale of plastic pollution in Bali, where trash-clogged beaches and a massive landfill reveal the hidden cost of tourism.

Pollution
Crisis

EPA urged to classify abortion drugs as pollutants

It follows 40 other anti-abortion groups and lawmakers previously calling for the EPA to assess the water pollution levels of the drug.

(NewsNation) — Anti-abortion group Students for Life of America is urging the Environmental Protection Agency to add abortion drug mifepristone to its list of water contaminants. It follows 40 other anti-abortion groups and lawmakers previously calling for the EPA to assess the water pollution levels of the abortion drug. “The EPA has the regulatory authority and humane responsibility to determine the extent of abortion water pollution, caused by the reckless and negligent policies pushed by past administrations through the [Food and Drug Administration],” Kristan Hawkins, president of SFLA, said in a release. “Take the word ‘abortion’ out of it and ask, should chemically tainted blood and placenta tissue, along with human remains, be flushed by the tons into America’s waterways? And since the federal government set that up, shouldn’t we know what’s in our water?” she added. In 2025, lawmakers from seven states introduced bills, none of which passed, to either order environmental studies on the effects of mifepristone in water or to enact environmental regulations for the drug. EPA’s Office of Water leaders met with Politico in November, with its press secretary Brigit Hirsch telling the outlet it “takes the issue of pharmaceuticals in our water systems seriously and employs a rigorous, science-based approach to protect human health and the environment.” “As always, EPA encourages all stakeholders invested in clean and safe drinking water to review the proposals and submit comments,” Hirsch added. Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Pollution
Water
Food

Data centers spark a ‘fight for the soul’ of this mostly Black Maryland county

Concerns over pollution and other impacts of data centers are spreading to Prince George’s County, which has wrestled with a legacy of environmental racism.

Taylor Frazier McCollum remembers when Landover Mall in her Prince George’s County neighborhood was a staple in family moments.It was the place where she felt safe trick-or-treating and costuming for the mall’s annual Halloween party. She can still taste the salt and heat from fresh Boardwalk Fries. Somewhere in her home, she said, are old buttons from a mall kiosk that offered the fun of printing a picture on clothing.

Pollution

Trump’s EPA' in 2025: A Fossil Fuel-Friendly Approach to Deregulation

The Trump administration has reshaped the Environmental Protection Agency, reversing pollution limits and promoting fossil fuels

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has transformed the Environmental Protection Agency in its first year, cutting federal limits on air and water pollution and promoting fossil fuels, a metamorphosis that clashes with the agency’s historic mission to protect human health and the environment.The administration says its actions will “unleash” the American economy, but environmentalists say the agency’s abrupt change in focus threatens to unravel years of progress on climate-friendly initiatives that could be hard or impossible to reverse.“It just constantly wants to pat the fossil fuel business on the back and turn back the clock to a pre-Richard Nixon era” when the agency didn’t exist, said historian Douglas Brinkley.Zeldin has argued the EPA can protect the environment and grow the economy at the same time. He announced “five pillars” to guide EPA’s work; four were economic goals, including energy dominance — Trump’s shorthand for more fossil fuels — and boosting the auto industry.Zeldin, a former New York congressman who had a record as a moderate Republican on some environmental issues, said his views on climate change have evolved. Many federal and state climate goals are unattainable in the near future — and come at huge cost, he said.“We should not be causing … extreme economic pain for an individual or a family” because of policies aimed at “saving the planet,” he told reporters at EPA headquarters in early December.But scientists and experts say the EPA's new direction comes at a cost to public health, and would lead to far more pollutants in the environment, including mercury, lead and especially tiny airborne particles that can lodge in lungs. They also note higher emissions of greenhouse gases will worsen atmospheric warming that is driving more frequent, costly and deadly extreme weather.Christine Todd Whitman, a Republican who led the EPA for several years under President George W. Bush, said watching Zeldin attack laws protecting air and water has been “just depressing.” “It’s tragic for our country. I worry about my grandchildren, of which I have seven. I worry about what their future is going to be if they don’t have clean air, if they don’t have clean water to drink,” she said.The EPA was launched under Nixon in 1970 with pollution disrupting American life, some cities suffocating in smog and some rivers turned into wastelands by industrial chemicals. Congress passed laws then that remain foundational for protecting water, air and endangered species.The agency's aggressiveness has always seesawed depending on who occupies the White House. Former President Joe Biden's administration boosted renewable energy and electric vehicles, tightened motor-vehicle emissions and proposed greenhouse gas limits on coal-fired power plants and oil and gas wells. Industry groups called rules overly burdensome and said the power plant rule would force many aging plants to shut down. In response, many businesses shifted resources to meet the more stringent rules that are now being undone.“While the Biden EPA repeatedly attempted to usurp the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law to impose its ‘Green New Scam,’ the Trump EPA is laser-focused on achieving results for the American people while operating within the limits of the laws passed by Congress,” EPA spokeswoman Brigit Hirsch said. Zeldin's list of targets is long Much of EPA’s new direction aligns with Project 2025, the conservative Heritage Foundation road map that argued the agency should gut staffing, cut regulations and end what it called a war on coal on other fossil fuels.“A lot of the regulations that were put on during the Biden administration were more harmful and restrictive than in any other period. So that’s why deregulating them looks like EPA is making major changes,” said Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of Heritage's Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment.But Chris Frey, an EPA official under Biden, said the regulations Zeldin has targeted “offered benefits of avoided premature deaths, of avoided chronic illness … bad things that would not happen because of these rules.”Matthew Tejada, a former EPA official under both Trump and Biden who now works at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said of the revamped EPA: “I think it would be hard for them to make it any clearer to polluters in this country that they can go on about their business and not worry about EPA getting in their way.”Zeldin also has shrunk EPA staffing by about 20% to levels last seen in the mid-1980s. Justin Chen, president of the EPA’s largest union, called staff cuts “devastating.” He cited the dismantling of research and development offices at labs across the country and the firing of employees who signed a letter of dissent opposing EPA cuts. Relaxed enforcement and cutting staff Many of Zeldin's changes aren't in effect yet. It takes time to propose new rules, get public input and finalize rollbacks. It's much faster to cut grants and ease up on enforcement, and Trump's EPA is doing both. The number of new civil environmental actions is roughly one-fifth what it was in the first eight months of the Biden administration, according to the nonprofit Environmental Integrity Project. “You can effectively do a lot of deregulation if you just don’t do enforcement,” said Leif Fredrickson, visiting assistant professor of history at the University of Montana.Hirsch said the number of legal filings isn't the best way to judge enforcement because they require work outside of the EPA and can bog staff down with burdensome legal agreements. She said the EPA is “focused on efficiently resolving violations and achieving compliance as quickly as possible” and not making demands beyond what the law requires.EPA's cuts have been especially hard on climate change programs and environmental justice, the effort to address chronic pollution that typically is worse in minority and poor communities. Both were Biden priorities. Zeldin dismissed staff and canceled billions in grants for projects that fell under the “diversity, equity and inclusion” umbrella, a Trump administration target.He also spiked a $20 billion “green bank” set up under Biden’s landmark climate law to fund qualifying clean energy projects. Zeldin argued the fund was a scheme to funnel money to Democrat-aligned organizations with little oversight — allegations a federal judge rejected. Pat Parenteau, an environmental law expert and former director of the Environmental Law School at Vermont Law & Graduate School, said the EPA's shift under Trump left him with little optimism for what he called “the two most awful crises in the 21st century” — biodiversity loss and climate disruption.“I don’t see any hope for either one,” he said. “I really don’t. And I’ll be long gone, but I think the world is in just for absolute catastrophe.”The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environmentCopyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – December 2025

Pollution
Business
Climate

Suggested Viewing

Let There be Light

Genesis 1:3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. Taiwan was founded on agriculture in the early days. However, in the face of rapid urbanization, there was no time to build infrastructure such as sewage pipelines, and a large amount of sewage was discharged indiscriminately, causing severe water pollution. To connect domestic sewage to the water purification plant and turn it into water resources that can be continuously recycled, the sewage engineering team adopted a most humane "equation" to appease and compensate the residents disturbed by the project. They invited the residents to participate in the beautification design of the back alley, which was damaged by the engineering project, and hired old painters who have painted "Roman Holiday" and "Back to the Future" movie billboards, and new generation painters to create with colorful brushes. The colorful paintings make the originally dark, dirty, and smelly back alleys clean and bright, and people are more willing to enter the back alleys to make tea and chat, a secret paradise for locals is then created. Let’s walk into the back alleys and see how the light makers light up the back alleys with human touch and let the light penetrate the water, creating Formosa’s unique “Light Making Equation”. This action has been carried out since 2016 and will continue in the future.

Water
Business
Pollution

Again, Together - The Cumulative Impact of Environmental Racism in Houston

"Again, Together" is a film created in partnership with Ronald L. Jones, bringing stories from communities across Houston that have been impacted by environmental racism — namely redlining, segregation, underinvestment, exposure to pollution, gentrification, inequitable disaster recovery resources and freeway development.

Social Justice
Pollution
Health

Precarious

An independent art film, Precarious is a haunting evocation of the aftermath of the explosion at Chernobyl, 25 years on. Accompanied by testimony from a group of unseen veterans of the disaster, Precarious bears witness to both the folly and resilience of humans and to nature's fragility.

Crisis
Pollution
Energy

LEAVES

An academic woman in Texas becomes concerned when a massive red oak in her backyard seems to be ailing, though she isn’t sure why it bothers her so much. At the same time, in her small cottage, her attention to her work is distracted by news reports she sees and hears. They tell in graphic terms of the out-of-control forest fires up and down the West Coast. Her attention is further pulled in the direction of other stories about the worsening conditions of the world’s rainforests which she discovers are disappearing at the astounding rate of 200,000 acres a day. Suddenly such stories are all she seems to hear and see on the radio or television or on her computer. But when she hears/sees a science report about how trees actually communicate with each other, she begins to realize there may be a connection between her tree and what she is learning from the news. She begins to recall a strong connection she herself has with that tree and allows that connection to regrow…..

Pollution
Forests
Inspirational

The Human Side Of Plastic: Babacar Thiaw

Babacar Thiaw, a visionary Senegalese surfer, entrepreneur, and environmental activist, is on a mission to tackle his country’s escalating plastic pollution crisis and preserve its coastline for future generations. Deeply connected to the ocean through his family’s history and inspired by his father’s teachings, Babacar channels this passion into innovative, community-driven solutions. He founded Senegal’s first zero-waste restaurant, setting a groundbreaking example of sustainability that has since inspired a growing movement across the country. This film follows Babacar’s journey as he champions the power of local action to combat global environmental challenges. Through his story, we witness how one person’s commitment can ignite widespread change, offering a hopeful message for a world in need of solutions. Babacar’s legacy is a call to action, reminding us all that safeguarding the future begins with the choices we make today.

Water
Pollution
Inspirational

Join us to forge
a sustainable future

Our team is always growing.
Become a partner, volunteer, sponsor, or intern today.
Let us know how you would like to get involved!

CONTACT US

sign up for our mailing list to stay informed on the latest films and environmental headlines.

Subscribers receive a free day pass for streaming Cinema Verde.
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.