The Bottom Line: Though there is a possible connection supported by some case reports and a few retrospective cohort studies, a definitive causation of military occupational exposure to radar with hemolymphatic and other cancers has not been established. However, physicians can still consider hemolymphatic cancer in their differential diagnosis if they know their patient has had occupational exposure to radar.
In their retrospective cohort study of a previously published case series of 47 patients diagnosed with cancer following years of occupational exposure to radiofrequency radiation (RFR), Peleg (2018) found “the consistent association of RFR and highly elevated HL cancer risk in the four groups spread over three countries, operating different RFR equipment types and analyzed by different research protocols, suggests a cause-effect relationship between RFR and HL cancers in military/occupational settings.”
In 2023, Peleg et. al published a second study analyzing data from a new case series of 46 patients diagnosed with cancer that had exposure to radar in a military setting and comparing them with similar groups from other studies, finding “a consistent, statistically significant, and well-documented atypically high HL PF, distinctly higher than expected in the community (Cancer Registry) or computed from unexposed comparison groups.”
The Bottom Line 