Thyroid cancer incidence 25 years after Chernobyl, in a Romanian cancer center: is it a public health problem?

Incidence of thyroid cancer (TC) has increased over the last decade, in most parts of the world, possibly because of increased ionizing radiations. We therefore analyzed records of patients with TC who were treated at our hospital (Prof. Dr. Ion Chiricuta, Institute of Oncology Cluj-Napoca, Romania) since the nuclear accident at Chernobyl in 1986. We performed a comparative analysis of the database for 10, 20 and 25 years after the Chernobyl accident. Changes in histological profiles and tumor sizes imply that, in addition to nuclear fallout, highly sensitive thyroid diagnostic procedures are responsible for this increase in reported incidence, which appears to be driven by improved discovery of small (<1 cm) preclinical tumors. This invites a real public health question.