A NEW study into the potential risks to health of living close to high-voltage power lines is likely to cause alarm, while also re-igniting all the old arguments.

There has long been concern in the Vale of York about the implications to health of the 50-mile overhead transmission line from Teesside to York, once opposed by a popular Press campaign.

Various studies have suggested and denied links to cancer, with the threat to children's health remaining a persistent worry.

Now, a fresh study reported today in the British Medical Journal suggests children living near high-voltage power lines are substantially more likely to develop leukaemia.

Those living within 200 metres of the overhead cables were 70 per cent more likely to develop the disease than children living more than 600 metres away. The increased risk to those living between 200 and 600 metres was put at 20 per cent. These results were based on an eight-year study into 9,700 children who developed leukaemia in England and Wales between 1962 and 1995.

This appears to offer gloomy confirmation of the fears long promoted by those opposed to pylons, including the protest group REVOLT. Yet nothing about this contentious subject is ever simple.

In April, the UK Childhood Cancer Study suggested that most cases of childhood leukaemia had their origins before birth and that there was little risk from power lines.

With so much conflicting evidence around, it is imperative that more time and money is spent trying to prove once and for all whether or not any such risk exists.

Updated: 11:20 Friday, June 03, 2005