The third and final phase of a 12-year study concluded Pratt & Whitney’s North Haven manufacturing plant did not increase employees’ risk of brain cancer, the University of Pittsburgh announced.
The study began in 2000 when Connecticut Department of Public Health officials began an investigation that found several cases of glioblastoma, the most common form of brain cancer, among employees at the North Haven jet engine manufacturing facility.
In 2002, the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health and the University of Illinois at Chicago started investigating occurrences of tumors and cancers among North Haven workers and seven other Pratt facilities, looking to see if cancer rates were associated with workplace exposures.
More than 223,000 workers who worked at Pratt from 1952 to 2001 were studied, and 723 had been diagnosed with tumors. Of those with tumors, 277 had glioblastoma.
The researchers also looked at 11 chemicals or agents suspected to be carcinogens.
The third phase of the study agreed with the first two phases in finding no statistically significant increase in tumor rates among Pratt workers compared to the Connecticut and U.S. rates. The workers at North Haven had a slightly higher rate of cancers, but the study concluded it was not related to workplace exposures.
“Though the 12-year study has concluded, Pratt & Whitney remains committed to the health and safety of its more than 33,000 employees worldwide and continues to make safe and environmentally-friendly workplaces a priority,” Pratt said in a released statement.
Pratt is headquartered in East Hartford and is a subsidiary of Hartford conglomerate United Technologies Corp.
