Medicine Hat resident Linda Cleveland is trying to raise awareness of radon gas exposure on the prairies. (CHAT News photo)

By Alex McCuaig

Radon Gas

Radon gas: A deadly but misunderstood issue for Albertans

Mar 6, 2020 | 12:26 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Radon is an odourless, colourless, radioactive gas with Canadians having some of the highest levels of exposure to on the planet and the prairies some of the most in the country.

It’s an issue Medicine Hat resident Linda Cleveland says she hopes to raise awareness of after her niece was diagnosed with lung cancer suspected to have been caused by exposure to radon gas while living in Regina and Saskatoon.

“It has personally touch our family. I have a 41-year-old niece in Saskatoon who about eight months ago couldn’t seem to get rid of a persistent cough and after several prescriptions and diagnostic tests was diagnosed with stage-two lung cancer,” said Cleveland.

It’s far from an uncommon phenomenon with radon exposure the second leading cause of lung cancer behind smoking – the leading cause of the cancer for those who don’t smoke.

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“Who knows about radon gas? It’s out of sight, out of mind. It’s colourless, it’s odourless, it’s in our homes,” said Cleveland. “And in different parts of Canada, the concentrations are very high.”

According to a University of Calgary professor conducting a study on the issue, the prairies as a whole is considered a high-risk zone for exposure to radon.

“Because it’s a gas, we breath it in and it damages the DNA of our lungs and that’s what drives it to lung cancer,” said Dr. Aaron Goodarzi, Canada research chair for radiation exposure disease education.

“Any house in the prairies potentially could have a radon problem. Our risks right now across the region are one in six. And in southern Alberta, you are looking at closer to one in five.”

Goodarzi added that children are especially at risk when it comes to radon exposure because of a higher respiration rate than an adult, spend more time in the home and growing lungs are more susceptible to radiation.

For that reason, Goodarzi is encouraging Albertans and Canadians to take part in the Evict Radon study which provides detectors – at cost for $52 – that can then provide information to identify homes which have an issue and then mitigate those risks.

“It’s not so much where you’re living. It’s the type of property and the features of that and this is something our study is really aimed at understanding. What are the features of a building – be it a house, an office, a school, whatever – that is actually contributing to higher radon,” said Goodarzi.

According to a Statistics Canada 2016 survey on radon gas, Albertans were the most likely Canadians not be able to accurately describe what radon was. According to the same study, 3,200 Canadians die annually from radon gas exposure.