Stop the Hogs!

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:14 am

Spreading cancer DU

by Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services

June 29, 2006

The unending game of "pretend" that the U.S. media allow George Bush to play on the global stage, so often letting his lying utterances hang suspended, unchallenged, in the middle of the story, as though they were plausible - as though a class of third-graders couldn't demolish them with a few innocent questions - feels like the journalistic equivalent of waterboarding. Gasp! Some truth, please!

I suggest the prez has forfeited the right to command a headline, or half a story, or an uninterrupted quote: ". . . we'll defend ourselves, but at the same time we're actively working with our partners to spread peace and democracy," he said last week in Austria.

Surely "spreading democracy" should no longer be allowed to appear in print, between now and 2008, unless accompanied by a parenthetical clarification ("not true," stated as profanely as local standards allow). And that, of course, would only be the media's first step back into integrity with the public.

The occupation of Iraq, the occupation of Afghanistan, the entire war (to promote) terror . . . please, please, can these no longer be trotted out in consequence-free abstraction, but as the high-tech malevolence they are, actively continuing the incalculable devastation of countries and their populations?

The bodies keep piling up, the toxic horrors spread. Hasn't anyone in this place ever heard of depleted uranium? Is the health crisis in Iraq and, indeed, throughout the Middle East and Central Asia, not to mention Kosovo and among returning vets for the last four American wars, somehow irrelevant to "the course" we're asked to stay?

"Two strange phenomena have come about in Basra which I have never seen before. The first is double and triple cancers in one patient. For example, leukemia and cancer of the stomach. We had one patient with two cancers - one in his stomach and kidney. Months later, primary cancer was developing in his other kidney - he had three different cancer types. The second is the clustering of cancer in families. We have 58 families here with more than one person affected by cancer. . . . My wife has nine members of her family with cancer."

This is Dr. Jawad Al-Ali, director of the oncology center at the largest hospital in Basra, speaking in 2003 at a peace conference in Japan. Why is it that only peace activists are able to hear people like this? Why hasn't he been asked to testify before Congress as its members debate the future of this war and the next?

"Children in particular are susceptible to DU poisoning," he went on. "They have a much higher absorption rate as their blood is being used to build and nourish their bones and they have a lot of soft tissues. Bone cancer and leukemia used to be diseases affecting them the most. However, cancer of the lymph system, which can develop anywhere on the body and has rarely been seen before the age of 12, is now also common."

Depleted uranium - DU - is the Defense Establishment euphemism for U-238, a byproduct of the uranium enrichment process and the ultimate dirty weapon material. It's almost twice as dense as lead, catches fire when launched and explodes on impact into microscopically fine particles, or "nano-particles," which are easily inhaled or absorbed through the skin; it's also radioactive, with a half-life of 4.468 billion years.

And we make bombs and bullets out of it - it's the ultimate penetrating weapon. We dropped at least 300 tons of it on Iraq during Gulf War I (the first time it was used in combat) and created Gulf War Syndrome. This time around, the estimated DU use on defenseless Iraq is 1,700 tons, far more of it in major population centers. Remember shock and awe? We were pounding Baghdad, in those triumphant early days, with low-grade nuclear weapons, raining down cancer, neurological disorders, birth defects and much, much more on the people we claimed to be liberating. We weren't spreading democracy, we were altering the human genome.

As we "protected ourselves," in the words of the president, from Iraq's non-existent weapons of mass destruction, we opened our own arsenal of WMD on them, contaminating the country's soil and polluting its air - indeed, unleashing a nuclear dust into the troposphere and contaminating the whole world.

"We used to think (DU) traveled up to a hundred miles," Chris Busby told me. Busby, a chemical physicist and member of the British government's radiation risk committee, as well as the founder of the European Committee of Radiation Risk, has monitored the air quality in Great Britain. Based on his findings, "It looks like it goes quite around the planet," he said.

While Bush mouths ironic whoppers - "We will be standing with the people of Afghanistan and Iraq until their hopes for freedom and liberty are fulfilled," he told the U.N. General Assembly a while back - his actions pass, in the words of former Livermore Labs scientist Leuren Moret, "a death sentence on the Middle East and Central Asia."

A war crime of unprecedented dimension is unfolding as we avert our eyes. Perhaps it's simply too big to see, or to grasp, so we lull ourselves into the half-belief that the powers that be know what they're doing and it will all turn out for the best. Meanwhile, the contagion spreads, the children die, the planet becomes uninhabitable.

---
Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at bkoehler@tribune.com or visit his Web site at commonwonders.com. © 2006 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

(posted with permission from author - Oscar)

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by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:16 am

TUNNEL VISION

Star Phoenix, January 18, 2007

The article “It is a make or break year for Sask” (S/PJan6) by Dwight Percy is very questionable.

He does not do his homework, and ends up with tunnel vision. He promotes dollars and jobs of uranium development, but does not consider, or care about, the by-products or hazards.

Uranium ore contains considerable radium, screened out in tailings to the JEB pit, now amounting to 830,800 tonnes. Surrounding pumps inhibit water flow, but can we keep the pumps running for a 1000 years?

Radium gives off radon gas which causes lung cancer. Dr. Geoffrey Howe updated (March 2006) the epidemiological research for uranium miners from Beaverlodge, and found they experienced a 30% higher risk than normal, with the delayed action of 15-20 years after exposure.

Reactors burn fuel pellets producing heat, plus 200 toxic chemicals, including deadly plutonium with a half-life of 24,400 years. Reactors do not give off carbon dioxide emissions, but they produce tritium gas with a half-life of 13 years, and carbon-14 with a half- life of 24,400 years, plus iodine 129 and uranium 235.

After 60 years scientists have not found a satisfactory way of disposing of these wastes, but simply pile them up, 260,000 tonnes at 442 sites in the world, waiting for an accident to happen. Radioactivity is carried on wind currents of the globe. After Chernobyl a radioactive cloud passed over Finland and Britain, the next day over Germany and France, the next day over Turkey and Iran, (See internet map: http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/
o.1518,412776.00.htm)

After the “Shock and Awe” bombardment of Baghdad with 1700 tons of depleted uranium bombs and ammunition, in 7 days extra radiation was detected by special equipment in Aldermaston, England.

We are all in this together. We keep building up the “value added” radioactivity to affect the gonads, lungs, and livers . . .of our youth.

Bill Adamson
Saskatoon, SK.

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:18 am

Letter to the Editor, Star Phoenix:

Saskatchewan's Uranium Legacy

Re: Calvert now gung-ho on uranium (SP, June 23, 2006 - Murray Lyons' Commentary)

Uranium, the most dangerous material on this planet, is forever.

Uranium goes on mutilating and killing for hundreds of thousands of years after it is brought to the surface.

Premier Calvert, are you seriously willing to put some short-term money ahead of the health of your grandchildren and their children's children by caving in to this greed-driven madness??

Is this the legacy you plan to leave them?

This is NOT due diligence! This is NOT protecting our environmental and health rights!

Please say NO to the uranium industry's pressure, Premier Calvert, while you still have that option.

Elaine Hughes
Archerwill, SK

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:21 am

Depleted Uranium Risk "Ignored"

----- Original Message -----
From: Elaine Hughes
To: Nilson,J. Min.Env. ; Cline, Eric, Min. IR ; Taylor, L. Min. Health ; Ambrose, R. Min. Envir ; Borgerson, L. MLA ; Premier Calvert ; Peter Prebble, MLA ; Clements, T. Min.Health

Cc: Sandra Finley, Sk Green ; Sask Environmental Society ; Sask Eco Network ; Nature Sask ; Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives ; Cdn. Health Coalition ; CSMonitor Environment ; David Suzuki Foundation ; Council of Canadians ; Greenpeace Canada ; Sierra Club - Can. ; Brad Wall Sask Party ; J. Layton, MP ; Karwaki,D.SK Lib. ; Krawetz,K.MLA

Sent: Thursday, November 02, 2006 8:29 PM

Subject: NUCLEAR: Depleted Uranium Risk "Ignored"

Minister Cline and Minister Nilson:

There is NO way to guarantee that uranium mined in Saskatchewan isn’t being used in DU bullets to kill and to disable and mutilate soldiers, civilians, even babies!

We know what uranium is and we know what uranium does – we cannot plead ignorance on this! To continue dragging this killer out of the ground and make more of it available to the planet is irresponsible and simply wrong-headed.

We must have a moratorium on the expansion of uranium mining in this province – NOW!

Elaine Hughes

Archerwill, SK

==================================

Depleted Uranium Risk "Ignored"

BBC News Wednesday 01 November 2006

UK and US forces have continued to use depleted uranium weapons despite warnings they pose a cancer risk, a BBC investigation has found.

Scientists have pointed to health statistics in Iraq, where the weapons were used in the 1991 and 2003 wars.

FULL STORY: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6105726.stm

===========================

(typed from the original by Elaine Hughes)

November 13, 2006

Ms Elaine Hughes
Box 23
Archerwill, SK S0E 0Bo

Dear Ms Hughes:

Thank you for your email of November 2, 2006, expressing your concerns with uranium production and the use of depleted uranium. The Honourable Eric cline, Q.C, Minister, Industry and Resources has forwarded your email to my office for a reply.

The Government of Saskatchewan is highly supportive of its uranium industry and continues to support the responsible development of the province's uranium resources. Uranium companies continue to meet all environmental goals, strongly support northern and aboriginal employment, and are good corporate citizens to the residents of the province.

Nationally and internationally, nuclear energy is increasingly seen as a clean solution to meet the public’s demand for more power and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Saskatchewan, as the world’s largest producer of uranium, has an opportunity to fuel this movement.

Depleted uranium is used in a number of peaceful applications other than just the military applications that receive media attention. Depleted uranium stocks worldwide are being used to blend-down highly enriched uranium from dismantled nuclear warhead which is then turned into fuel for nuclear reactors. This use is contributing to the reduction of nuclear warheads worldwide. There are also many studies that conflict with information in the report that you have provided. The Government of Saskatchewan continues to monitor all studies related to uranium and the nuclear fuel cycle.

I once again encourage you to contact the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission regarding the use of depleted uranium.

Sincerely,

(Original signed by Glen Veikle (sp?) for

Bruce Wilson

Cc: The Honourable Eric Cline, Q.C. Minister, Industry and Resources
The Honourable John Nilson, Minister Environment

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:24 am

Depleted Uranium Saskatchewan's Gift to the Afghan people

http://www.actupinsask.org:80/index.php ... d=387&Item

Contributed by John W. Warnock
Sunday, 30 September 2007

Six years ago on October 7 the U.S. government launched a war against the government of Afghanistan. Air power was the key. Two B-2 Stealth bombers flew from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri, each carrying sixteen 2,0000-lb satellite directed bombs. Five B-1B and 10 B-52 heavy bombers flew from Diego Garcia, the U.S. island-base guarding the Persian Gulf. Twenty-five strike aircraft attacked from two U.S. aircraft carriers in the Arabian Sea. U.S. Navy F-18 Hornets and F-14 Tomcats dropped 500-lb guided bombs and 2,000-lb earth penetrators. Fifty Tomahawk cruise missiles were launched from U.S. and British ships and submarines. The targets for the first few days were military facilities, both those of the Taliban government and those used by Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda.

For the Tora Bora bunkers the U.S. Air Force allotted 32 individual GBU-31, 2,000-lb bombs, carried by the B-1 Lancer bombers, launched from the USA and from Diego Garcia. A single aircraft can carry up to 24 tons of bombs. The 5,000-lb bunker busters and the earth penetrator weapons were dropped by B-2 bombers. Within a few days the U.S. government announced that they had destroyed the main targets.

Supporting the Northern Alliance

By October 29, 70% of U.S. air strikes were in support of the Northern Alliance armed forces, most guided by the U.S. Special Forces on the ground. The MQ-1 Predator drone with Hellfire missiles was operating over Taliban forces, directing air attacks and launching missiles. By the fifth of November the number of individual air missions was up to 120 per day, adding F-16 and F-15 fighter-bombers out of U.S. bases in Kuwait.
The turning point in the war to oust the Taliban government came on November 6 at Mazar-e Sharif, a key city in the northern plains. Attack aircraft rained down hundreds of MK82 500-lb bombs. B-52 bombers used carpet bombing to kill thousand of Taliban forces. It was here that U.S. forces dropped the first BLU-82 Daisy Cutter bomb, each weighing 15,000 lbs, producing devastation over a 600-yard radius. All the weapons used by the U.S. air attack included depleted uranium shielding.

Depleted uranium

Depleted uranium (DU) is produced during the uranium enrichment process. The U-235 used to produce fuel for reactors generating electricity is removed, leaving the U-238 isotope. The material is extremely dense and increases the penetration ability of weapons; it is used to coat shells and warheads on missiles and bombs. On impact the shell, with its uranium and traces of americium and plutonium, vaporizes and becomes very tiny particles of radioactive dust. When it is inhaled it can stay in the body, emitting radiation. The DU used in U.S. weapons comes from the uranium mines in Saskatchewan.

In the 1991 Gulf war DU was delivered almost exclusively with shells from tanks and ammunition used by aircraft. It is used in all armour piercing ordnance. In the wars in Bosnia in 1995 and Kosovo in 1999, NATO allies added DU missiles and bunker busting bombs. Thousands of DU bombs and missiles have been used by U.S. forces in the Afghan and Iraq wars. A typical bunker bomb contains 1.5 tonnes of depleted uranium.

In August 2003 Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor used a Geiger counter to test several sites in Bagdad near where bunker buster bombs and missiles had fallen. He found radiation readings which were between 1,000 and 1,900 times higher than normal background radiation readings. DU weapons are still being extensively used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Gulf War Syndrome

After the 1991 Gulf War, birth defects and leukemia rose dramatically in the areas around Basra where these weapons were used. By 2003 the U.S. Defense Department admitted that over 200,000 Gulf War veterans had filed for compensation for death, illness or disabilities. The veterans refer to this as “Gulf War Syndrome.” In the first Gulf War, the U.S.-led coalition suffered 148 deaths. Since then 8,000 veterans of this war have experienced early death.

In 1996 the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring that DU weapons were illegal “weapons of mass destruction.” In 2002 the U.N. Human Rights Convention passed a resolution urging a ban on the use of any DU weapons. We will have to wait to find out the impact of these weapons on the people of Afghanistan and the men and women in the U.S., Canadian and NATO armed forces.

John W. Warnock is a Regina political economist and author. This is an extract from his forthcoming book, Afghanistan: The Creation of a Failed State, to be published by Fernwood in 2008.

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:28 am

June 7, 2008

Minister of Environment Heppner
Legislative Building
Regina, SK S4S 0B3

FAX: (306) 787-1669

Dear Minister Heppner,

Thank you for your letter of May 30, 2008 addressing my concerns about uranium mining and nuclear energy for Saskatchewan.

I have several questions raised by your letter which I have set out below.

1) As I’m sure you know, it takes 20-30 years for cancer to develop in a person exposed to radiation. I would like to know what measures your government is or will take to keep track of the health of mine and mill workers throughout their lifetime, even after they have ceased working in the industry and/or have moved away.

2) What plans does your government have for the safe, longterm storage of used nuclear fuel, prevention of theft of processed or depleted uranium, emergency procedures in case of a spill during transportation of uranium or spent fuel, or, heaven forbid, a nuclear ‘accident’ at a nuclear power plant anywhere in this province?

3) What level of insurance is your government able to obtain for compensation to Saskatchewan residents injured in the event of a nuclear power plant failure should one be built in this province?

4) Considering the growing number of mines, mills, exploration sites, etc., operating over the enormous area of northern Saskatchewan, I would like to know how many provincially- and federally-appointed inspection officers are employed to adequately inspect and monitor these operations. What are their qualifications and what expertise must each of them have? Where are they based, and do they have the authority and ability to conduct thorough inspections without warnings?

5) Where on the government website might I find the ‘provincial requirements for environmental assessments and the technical reviews of all aspects of a development’ as mentioned in your letter?

6) I also would like to know the level of expertise of persons in your government, third party auditors or inspectors who carry out and approve the environmental assessments in order for this industry to receive licences to carry out operations.

7) Finally, what procedures have been put in place for consultation with First Nations regarding regional land use planning, proper cumulative impacts assessment that looks at the full impact of existing, planned and reasonably foreseeable development, and for the establishment of appropriate baseline data, benchmarks and related measures to guide development and to ensure that First Nations can exercise its rights to their land and their culture, now and in the future?

I am sure that you will agree that, as any decisions on nuclear developments in the province will inevitably impact on public health and safety, and have longterm implications for public finances, the public should be in full possession of information on these matters.

I thank you for your time and look forward to your early reply.

Yours truly,

Elaine Hughes
Box 23,
Archerwill, SK S0E 0B0

Cc: Premier Wall, FAX: (306) 787-0885

====================================

Retyped from original by E. Hughes on June 7, 2008

Minister of Environment
Legislative Building
Regina, Saskathewan S4S 0B3

May 30, 2008

Elaine Hughes
(tybach@sasktel.net)

Dear Mrs. Hughes:

I am writing in response to your email to Premier Brad Wall, regarding uranium mining and nuclear energy in Saskatchewan.

I can assure you that the health and safety of Saskatchewan residents and the protection of the environment are of the utmost importance to the Government of Saskatchewan in assessing and regulating all industry in Saskatchewan.

The uranium mining industty in the province is under strict scrutiny and regulation by both provincial and federal authorities including the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Advanced Education, Employment, and Labour. Health, safety and environmental protection at these facilities require extensive routine monitoring and reporting and are increasingly governed by international standards and supported by external, third party audits. The uranium operations in Saskatchewan have been recognized as world leaders in environmental monitoring, worker safety, and waste management technology. The Ministry of Environment will continue to use its regulatory authority to maintain and enhance applicable standards.

In regards to new developments, including nuclear power production and other value added phases, Saskatchewan has an environmental assessment review process that must be followed for all new developments and present developments undergoing significant changes. This includes fulfilling provincial requirements for environmental assessments, technical reviews of all espects of a development, consultations with stakeholder and Aboriginal groups, and opportunities for public review and comment. This process is in place to ensure that all foreseeable impacts and benefits of a development are understood and to ensure the protection of the residents of Saskatchewan and the environment. The Ministry of Environment encourages Saskatchewan residents, like yourself, to become active participants in the environmental assessment reviews.

…2
-------------------------------------
Elaine Hughes
Page 2
May 30, 2008
__________________________________________________

Thank you for sharing your concerns, I appreciate your interest in this matter. It is encouraging to see fellow residents of Saskatchewan interested in the health and safety of our citizens and in the protection of our environment.

Sincerely,

“Original signed by Nancy Heppner, Minister of Environment”

cc: Honourable Brad Wall, Premier of Saskatchewan

========================================

----- Original Message -----
From: Elaine Hughes
To: SK Min.Env.Heppner ; SK Premier Wall ; SK Party Caucus
Sent: Friday, May 02, 2008 10:39 AM
Subject: Mayors seek mining moratorium

To: Premier Wall
Legislative Bldg. Regina, SK

FAX: (306) 787-0885

May 2, 2008

Mr. Wall, why aren't you and your government able or willing to follow the lead of BC, and now New Brunswick, and put a stop to uranium mining, and recent talk of a nuclear power plant, in this province?

Surely, the health and safety of Saskatchewan residents, our water, our environment, the future health and safety of your grandchildren and ours, are just as precious as those of other provinces, are they not?

You have the perfect opportunity to do the right thing, Mr. Wall: put a ban on all future uranium mining permits and, before it gets started, stop all this nonsense of a nuclear power plant in Saskatchewan.

Please don't allow insatiable greed to destroy our beautiful province.

Elaine Hughes
Archerwill, SK

===============================

HEALTH DANGERS OF URANIUM MINING AND JURISDICTI0NAL QUESTIONS - The British Columbia Medical Association
A SUMMARY OF MATERIAL BEFORE THE BRITISH COLUMBIA ROYAL COMMISSION OF INQUIRY HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ~ URANIUM MINING ~
PRESENTED: AUGUST l980 BY E.R. YOUNG, B.Sc., M.D. R.F. WOOLLARD, M.D. ON BEHALF OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH COMMITTEE OF THE BRITISH COLUMBIA MEDICAL ASSOCIATION - ACADEMY OF MEDICINE BUILDING, 1807 WEST 10TH AVENUE, VANCOUVER BC Telephone (604) 736-5551
Brief Summary of Major Points:
Uranium Industry: Occupational Exposures
Uranium Industry: Public Exposures
Regulatory Framework: Setting Standards
Verbatim Excerpts from the 470 page report:
LUNG CANCER AMONG UNDERGROUND MINERS
MORE EVIDENCE ON LUNG CANCER AND RADON GAS
RADON RISK ESTIMATES: Comparison with a Safe Industry
ATOMIC ENERGY CONTROL BOARD: Unfit to Regulate
RADON GAS IN HOMES: an Industrially-Induced Epidemic?
Clarification from the BCMA President
AN OPEN LETTER: To Whom It May Concern

BCMA REPORT: SUMMARY OF MAJOR POINTS - URANIUM INDUSTRY: OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURES
Delay of hazard recognition and consequent worker non-protection is an unfortunate but recurring theme in the Canadian regulatory and uranium industry history: Radon daughter radiation is a health hazard to workers in advanced stages of exploration, such as in tunnels and shafts, where very high levels of 1.6 working levels (WL) have been recorded in low grade deposits (1600 times normal background levels).

Average radon daughter levels in underground mines range from 0.1 WL to about 1 WL (that is, 100 to 1000 times normal background levels). In open-pit mines. the high density of radon (7.8 times heavier than air) and atmospheric inversion conditions can cause levels of from 2 to 10 WL in moderate to high grade ore bodies. Workers in open pits with low to moderate grade ore receive 2 to 4 times the normal lifetime dose of radon daughter radiation during their employment life, under conditions where there are no inversions. In a uranium mill, with low to moderate grade ore, the millers receive from 5 to 14 times the normal background lifetime dose of radon daughter radiation during their 30-year working lives.

Uranium millers may receive doses of gamma radiation 1000 times background from high grade ores.

Although the AECB assumes workers are receiving only a small fraction of the annual limits, this is not borne out by the facts. Despite AECB claims to the contrary, the risks from radiation in uranium mining far exceed those of a ''safe'' industry. The 4 WLM annual maximum permissible exposure to radon and thoron daughters should be lowered to less than 1 WLM per year immediately, and serious consideration should be given to lowering it to 0.4 WLM per year [ a factor of 10 lower than present permissible levels ]. This would still exceed risks for a safe industry using AECB criteria. The AECB is unfit to regulate uranium mining. Canada has lagged many years behind other countries in its collection of cancer death statistics among uranium miners. It is most unfortunate that there has been such a long delay in publication of the follow-up study of the Elliot Lake miners. Nuclear industry proponents have tended to minimize risk through lack of knowledge, generalizations, quoting outdated studies, dilution of risk estimates, unsubstantiated arguments, personal bias, basing conclusions on inadequate studies, doublethink, and assuming workers cannot absorb the full truth. The new ICRP weighting system [ based on the concept of an ''effective dose equivalent'' ] , if accepted, will permit much larger doses of radiation at a time when reports indicate that cancer risk is many times what it was considered to be 22 years ago.

AECB reliance on the ICRP as a basis for standards is unwise. That body has become a political and social arbiter rather than a scientific advisory group.

URANIUM INDUSTRY: PUBLIC EXPOSURES

Uranium tailings will remain radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years, and will require such expensive long-term surveillance and maintenance by government and the local citizenry as to make statements about uranium mining providing revenue very misleading: Misuse of uranium tailings has led to internal lung doses calculated to be 100 rems per year to the public. Conservative calculations show that the public near uranium tailings will receive a 25 percent increase in lifetime radon daughter radiation. Uranium tailings will have appreciable radioactivity for more than 100,000 years. In Canada we now have approximately 100 million tons of radioactive tailings; this will eventually increase to about one billion tons by the year 2000. There have been many uranium tailings disasters in Australia, Canada and the United States. even with the most modern ''state of the art'' tailings dams. The present average allowable exposure to the public [ of 0.02 WL of radon exposure ] could result in 200-300 extra cases of lung cancer per 10,000 people per lifetime. In light of current knowledge, this might be considered tantamount to allowing an industrially induced and publicly sanctioned epidemic of cancer. This present guideline of 0.02 WL must be immediately withdrawn and replaced with ''no exposure (above ambient levels) of any carcinogen permitted to the local public''. Radon contamination of ground water may be a health risk in pincushion drilling typical of advanced exploration, yet under present AECB regulations, a couple of hundred drill holes can be made without obtaining a license. AECB admitted to having no scientific data to show this is safe; the regulation was based on an arbitrary administrative decision.

Radium-226 [ released from uranium tailings ] is a superb producer of osteosarcoma [ bone cancer ] .

In 1959 the ICRP recommended a maximum exposure of 3 picocuries per liter (pCi/l) of [ dissolved ] radium-226 to the public. In 1968 Canada allowed a maximum permissible concentration of 100 picocuries per liter, with an objective of 10 picocuries per liter [ of dissolved radium-226 ] .

Ontario has retained a maximum permissible concentration of 3 picocuries per liter [ of dissolved radium-226 ] . New ''recalculations'' of the ICRP recommend relaxing the radium-226 standard to 27 picocuries per liter (9 times the Ontario limit of 3 picocuries per liter). [ NOTE: Canada has since authorized this increase in permissible radium levels in drinking water. ] Certain uranium mining companies in Ontario are discharging radium-contaminated effluents which exceed the standard of 3 picocuries per liter. With the relaxation of the standard to 27 this will no longer be [ considered as ] a technical or regulatory problem. American standards are as usual more stringent than Canada's; in the U.S.A., [ dissolved ] radium-226 plus radium-228 cannot exceed 5 picocuries per liter. A U.S. Public Health Service study shows increased bone cancer in communities with 4.2 picocuries per liter of [ dissolved ] radium-226 in drinking water, as compared with communities having only 1 picocurie per liter. The concept that a radium-226 limit for the public can be set ten times too high because the usual radium-226 levels will only be one-tenth of that, is as inane as setting a speed limit of 200 kilometers per hour in a school zone because most caring people will only drive at 20 km/hr anyway. There are no standards for total radium-226 (dissolved and particulate); one wonders if that is because total radium-226 effluents range as high as 168 picocuries per liter.

REGULATORY FRAMEWORK: SETTING STANDARDS

The BCMA calls for an Emergency Task Force into tightening the present radiation standards. Review by the AECB or by its Committees is unacceptable; the Task Force should be under the Advisory Council on Occupational Health and Safety or the Science Council of Canada: Industry and regulatory officials are overly eager to select conversion factors for dose calculations that are at the lower end of the spectrum of values proposed. This consequently leads to lower risk estimates of radiation effects. The fact that the calculations are subject to ''large unquantifiable uncertainty'' leaves one with little confidence in the conclusions of health risks made by nuclear physicists and former employees of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, now associated with the Atomic Energy Control Board. Canadian regulations lag far behind countries which are more conscious and concerned about occupational and public health and safety. Canadians cannot continue to allow vested interest Ministries and regulatory bodies to promulgate maximum permissible exposure levels [ of radiation ] . The BCMA is on record as calling for a national enquiry into nuclear energy in Canada, [ including ] a total reassessment of the structure and function of the AECB; this resolution arose out of our investigations of nuclear waste management and uranium mining. That the AECB consistently and seriously neglected its statutory responsibility for the regulation of uranium mines is obvious to the most casual observer. We believe that the continued use of the ALARA principle, [ unenforced ] guidelines, and the encouragement of industrial self-regulation is a combination of objectives that will [ continue to ] compromise the effectiveness of the AECB as a regulator of uranium mining.

EXCERPTS FROM THE TEXT OF THE BCMA REPORT - LUNG CANCER AMONG UNDERGROUND MINERS

Dr. Wagoner well described the discovery of the relationship between lung cancer and radon daughters:
"The real nature of this pulmonary disorder among miners of the Schneeberg (Germany) area was not identified until 1879 when Harting and Hesse first diagnosed it. "In 1913, Ainstein reported that of 665 Schneeberg miners dying during 1875-1912, 40 percent (or 276) died of lung cancer. "Pircham and Sikl, in 1932, reported that of 17 deaths observed during 1929-1930 among miners of uranium-bearing ores in Joachimsthal (Czechoslovakia), 53 percent (or 9) were due to cancer of the lung. "These same investigators ... concluded that the most probable cause of these tumors was radiation in the air of the mines. These investigators also made note 'the miners themselves state that discovery of a rich uranium vein is always followed some years later by a strongly increased mortality among them'." Hollywood, in his article on "The Epidemiology of Lung Cancer Among Workers Exposed to Radon and Radon Daughters" in May, 1979, noted: "By 1940, then, excess deaths from lung cancer among two groups of European miners had been associated with relatively high concentrations of radon in the mine atmosphere. In that same year ... conclusions were drawn that prolonged breathing of air containing a high concentration of radon, may have caused what was estimated at that time to be a 30-fold increase in the incidence of lung cancer. "The percentage of miners developing carcinoma of the lungs in Schneeberg was 63 percent, in Joachimsthal 42 percent, and in St. Lawrence [Newfoundland] 36 percent." Studies in the U.S. were undertaken in the 1950's on uranium miners in the Colorado Plateau area. These results began to appear in the early 60's, and they showed an increase in lung cancer with an increase in exposure to radon daughters. Dr. Wagoner noted that these studies had to be extended and refined to rule out any possible other agent: "First there was a basic denial that there was such a problem. Then there was a position that it had to be due to smoking. Then it was on the basis -- well, it had to be due to hard rock mining. There were sequential analyses undertaken to address all of these, what in statistical terms I would call confounding factors, but in public health terms I would call delaying [factors]. "In 1967, Lunden demonstrated that during the period 1950 through June 1965, white underground uranium miners experienced 37 deaths due to lung cancer whereas only 7.3 would have been expected [and] through September 1967, 62 deaths due to lung cancer as contrasted to only 10.02 expected."[As noted by Dr. Wagoner, referring to the Colorado data] , observed versus expected carcinoma of the lung cases in 1978 was 205 versus 40, with an attributable risk of 164 men "who have died due to lung cancer over and above what I would expect in that population if they had not been subjected to those exposures. I would consider that as epidemic." With the long latent period of carcinoma induction by low level radiation, these numbers will increase further over the next 20 years. The submission of Dr. Wigle relating to the St. Lawrence (Newfoundland) fluorspar miners who were exposed to elevated levels of radon daughters demonstrated an observed incidence of lung cancer of 65 versus an expected 6.41, with an average ratio of observed to expected of 10.1 . Dr. Radford noted that the ongoing studies, such as the one of the Newfoundland fluorspar miners, "clearly indicate the seriousness of this problem, still with us fifty years after the risk was originally identified in the Bohemian miners of central Europe." The collection of the Canadian [uranium mining] data began in 1974.
The Royal Commission on Health and Safety in Mines in Ontario [the Ham Commission] commissioned an epidemiological study of the uranium miners in the Elliot Lake area; this was conducted from 1975 to 1976. Dr. Muller noted that "The Ontario uranium mining population is characterized by relatively low exposures and relatively short periods of exposure. There is, therefore, less extrapolation involved from high to low doses and dose rates, ... relatively short periods of exposure in most men, ... and nearly 20 years of observation time." The Ham Commission analyzed the data [81 observed lung cancer deaths versus 45.08 expected] in order to determine whether radon daughters were the agent: "The lung cancer cases tended to accumulate more in the higher exposure groups, which indicates that lung cancer risk was greater in the higher exposure groups than in the lower ones." In his analysis of the Ontario data, Ellett stated: "From the occupational health point of view, it is certain that exposure to radon daughters leads to an increased risk of lung cancer for the working force as a whole, and that this risk extends to levels of exposure that are below current occupational guidelines." According to the United Steelworkers of America, the number of lung cancer cases should now read well in excess of 100 at Elliot Lake and are "climbing steadily".

MORE EVIDENCE ON LUNG CANCER AND RADON GAS

Dr. Axelson, in his submission on Swedish Miner Lung Carcinoma, stated: "Several studies have shown an increased lung cancer mortality among Swedish metal [zinc-lead-iron] miners as probably caused by the exposure to radon and radon daughters in the mine atmosphere. In a nation-wide survey, as yet unpublished, the average lung cancer mortality among Swedish miners was found to be about fivefold the normal. "These Swedish studies deal with a life-time follow-up of miners, whereas most other mining populations have been studied by means of cohorts with a follow-up time of not less than about 25-30 years or more."
Wagoner noted that "In 1942, Campbell reported the induction of lung tumors in 20.3 percent of mice exposed by inhaling dust from the Joachimsthal mines, whereas only 2.1 percent was found in the unexposed controls." The most detailed and conclusive evidence showing the carcinogenic effect of radon daughters has been done by Dr. Lafuma of the Radiation Protection Department of the Atomic Energy Commission of France: "Studies have been carried out by two teams from the Commission of Atomic Energy in France.... Throughout the ten years of research, close to 10,000 rats were used of which 3,000 were used for radon studies. In these 3,000 rats, more than 600 pulmonary cancers were observed." Dr. Lafuma's research indicates a higher risk [per unit of exposure] at lower cumulative working level months (WLM). It seems that the controversy over low level radiation which is now taking place is following a similar pattern to that of the health hazards of cigarettes that began 30 years ago when epidemiological studies were met with flat denials that cigarettes could possibly cause cancer of the lung. One of the serious consequences of down-playing the effects of low-level radiation will be to deny those who have developed various carcinomas adequate compensation which may be their due. With the abundant information on the effects of low-level ionizing radiation, the humane course of action would be to give the worker, or in most cases the deceased worker's family, the benefit of the doubt as to whether his or her particular carcinoma was a product of radiation, and compensate accordingly.
Society and industry must be willing to shoulder this burden if we wish to continue with the production of nuclear power and nuclear weapons.

RADON RISK ESTIMATES: COMPARISON WITH A SAFE INDUSTRY

Mr. Bush, Manager of the Radiation Protection Division of the AECB, described mining as an industry with high risk: "one [accidental] death per year for every thousand workers" According to Mr. Bush,
"Workers in the safest occupations -- manufacturing, for example -- are subject to an annual risk of accidental death of about one in ten thousand." When asked whether the mining industry in Canada was an industry with a high standard of safety, Mr. Bush replied: "No". [In particular] he knew of no industry that exceeds the combined risk of uranium mining. According to the AECB, "The risk of lung cancer associated with an exposure of 4 WLM per year over a normal working life is considered to be acceptably small, compared to the risk of [accidental] death associated with other ["safe"] industries." Mr. Bush re-iterated this in cross-examination: "The risk of working with the present dose limits is no greater than the occupational risk of the safer industries." Of course, what he clearly means is that the risk [from uranium mining] is no greater than adding the occupational risk of a safer industry on top of the occupational risk of an industry [mining] which does not have a high standard of safety. [In any event], the risk of accidental death in a "safe industry" can be approximated at 100 deaths per million workers per year. Several authors have produced estimates of lung cancer cases per million people exposed to one working level month (WLM). According to Mr. Bush, "Dr. Gordon Stuart, formerly of Chalk River, reviewed the American and Czechoslovakian data and he concluded that ... you get about 14 to 20 lung cancer cases per million people exposed to one WLM. "A year or two ago, the [European] Nuclear Energy Agency concluded that a reasonable risk estimate, for purposes of radiation protection, would be about 100 cases of lung cancer per million people per WLM." Sevc, in his calculations of the [Czechoslovakian] data in 1970, found "0.23 ± 0.04 lung cancer cases per thousand workers per WLM [that is, 230 ± 40 lung cancer cases per million workers per WLM] as an estimate of average radiation risk for the total group."
As can be seen, even using the Nuclear Energy Agency's calculations, the [ cancer ] risk to miners would be four times as great at present radiation standards [4 WLM per year] than the accident risk in safe industries. Using Sevc's calculations, [the cancer risk] would be 9.2 times as great -- approximately 10 times as great -- which would then be in a category of industries with a high degree of risk [one accidental death per thousand workers per year]. Moreover, there is a very important flaw in the AECB's comparison of accidental risks per year with lung carcinomas, which makes direct comparison meaningless: Risk of accidental occupational death is a relatively instantaneous risk, which exists (by definition) only during the period of employment and ends upon termination of employment. Risk of lung cancer from radiation, although beginning after several years of employment, continues many years past termination of employment; thus a gradually flowering crop of cancers grows larger each year. [Indeed] Archer & Linden in 1967 concluded that an exposure of 120 WLM "appears to double the lung cancer incidence characteristic of the general [unexposed] population."

Summary of doubling dose estimates for lung cancer in uranium miners:

Archer (1967)..........................120 WLM
Hewitt (1980) - Ontario............40-5O WLM
- Newfoundland.........5O WLM
Sevc (1976)..........................~50 WLM
US EPA (1980)..........................~40 WLM
Ellett (1980)...........................40 WLM
BEIR-II (1972)...........................34 WLM
BCMA (1980) - NIOSH & Sevc.......19-20 WLM
BEIR-III (198O).........................12-17 WLM
Axelson (1980)............................2 WLM

The lifetime incidence of lung cancer in males can be calculated to equal 52.5 per thousand, equivalent to approximately a five percent lifetime risk for lung cancer development in males. It would appear that the doubling dose from exposure to radon daughters would be 40 WLM or less, in the exposure ranges experienced by today's miners. Thus, at a lifetime dose of 40 WLM, a miner would have approximately a 10 percent rather than a 5 percent risk of developing carcinoma of the lung; that is a risk of 1250 lung cancer cases per million workers per WLM. The risk [per million workers] would be four times as high at today's maximum permissible exposure of 4 WLM per year. Compare this value with the risk of accidental death in safe industries of 100 accidental deaths per million workers per year! Because of the long latent period of lung cancer, and its variability with age and smoking, Archer has calculated the attributable cancer for lifetime per million [workers] per WLM, which is certainly the value most significant to the mining population. Using the exposure rates present in today's mines and mills, the attributable cancer per lifetime per WLM is approximately 1000 [per million workers].

ATOMIC ENERGY CONTROL BOARD: UNFIT TO REGULATE

The AECB [Atomic Energy Control Board] policy regarding a lifetime exposure limit for uranium miners [February 1978] is based on one study [published in 1969], which is not only 11 years out of date, but which has been revised several times by the authors. The AECB notes in passing that in Ontario, "only 20 of the 81 lung cancer victims who had worked in uranium mines had accumulated as much as 120 WLM (the exposures of the other 61 victims being 0 to 99 WLM, or 35 WLM on average)."
Ignoring this and using the 1969 study (which seems to be the extent of their literature review as no other references are cited) AECB states: "If one had to choose a WLM value that had some special significance 840 WLM would be a more logical choice [than 120 WLM] because it marks the level above which lung cancer incidence appears to increase with increasing exposure; (i.e. although an excess of lung cancer is evident in each of the exposure categories, the excess appears to be independent of exposure below 840 WLM.)"

Such a policy statement, based on antiquated data and inadequate literature review, would be irresponsible coming from the nuclear industry, let alone the regulatory agency of that industry. However, as will become clear, it is difficult to ascertain where one ends and the other begins. The Manager of the Radiation Protection Division of the AECB is Mr. Bush, who has a degree in Chemical Engineering (1955). He worked for Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) in Chalk River from 1957 to 1969, and subsequently with the AECB from 1969 to the present. One notes that Mr. Bush is responsible for developing radiation protection guidelines and regulations. Mr. Bush admitted, "I'm not a medical doctor. I'm not an epidemiologist." (This is evident as well from the Board's paltry data analysis upon which their statements of risk are made.) The AECB "is currently considering how the latest recommendations [on permissible radiation exposures for workers and the public, put forward by the International Commission on Radiological Protection ~ ICRP 1977] might be incorporated into AECB regulations. AECB is being assisted in its review of the ICRP recommendations by its Advisory Committee on Radiologic Protection [ACRP], which it established early in 1979. The Advisory Committee was set up to provide the Board with independent advice ... no Board staff member is [on it]." Mr. Bush pointed out the difficulty the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission may have in adopting these new ICRP higher dose limits: "they would be difficult to implement under the climate of nuclear controversy currently existing in the U.S.A. For example, the new ICRP system of dose limitation implies higher dose limits for irradiation of some individual organs ..." The Chairman of the new Advisory Committee, Dr. G. C. Butler, listed members of this Committee. It includes himself, who has been an employee of AECL at Chalk River from 1957 to 1965, a member of the ICRP Committee from 1963 to 1973 and again from 1973 to 1977, and worked from 1945 to 1947 with the National Research Council (Ottawa) in the Atomic Energy Project; he has been with the National Research Council since 1965. It also includes Dr. Marko of AECL [Director of Health Physics at Chalk River] and Dr. Hollywood from Newfoundland, who wrote a section in the AECB Elliot Lake Uranium Mine Inspector's Training Course Manual. The [1979 Elliot Lake] manual contains the following: "The AECB has seen no convincing evidence for a limitation on cumulative lifetime exposure, provided the average exposure received during a working life does not exceed 4 WLM per year...." "Radiation damage is observed only at doses higher than about 100 rads; and although effects have generally not been observed at lower doses, it is assumed for radiation protection purposes that the effect is proportional to the dose right down to zero exposure." Not only is the last sentence grossly in error, any trainee inspector who is using the graph [showing "observed" cancers at low doses to be less than "expected" cancers obtained by linear extrapolation] would be led to the incorrect conclusion that for all radiation, the linear hypothesis will over-estimate the effects. Other members [of ACRP] include Dr. Jan Muller from the Department of Labour, Ontario, [who is of the opinion] that there is no serious risk at current standards of 4 WLM per year of radon exposure, despite mounting evidence to the contrary. No follow-up study on the Ontario uranium miners has been completed because the information is still being processed by Dr. Muller. It is unfortunate, because of the crucial nature of the Ontario studies, that there has been such a long delay since 1976. It is hoped that this data will be available to the scientific community soon. Dr. Butler also noted that his Committee did have Dr. Stuart from AECL, but that he had now retired. [ACRP now includes both Dr. Myers and Dr. Newcombe, both of AECL.] Dr. Butler agreed that his Committee had not asked any independent bodies, such as the Canadian Medical Association, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons, or the Royal Society, to place a member of its own choice on the Committee. The ''independence'' of this Committee must be seriously questioned. This lack of ''independence'' is characteristic of the AECB. As Dr. Bates [David Bates, M.D., Chairman of the B.C. Royal Commission on Uranium Mining] noted about the previous [AECB] Standing Committee on Safety, "There appeared to be only one M.D. on it, and he had worked at Chalk River for all of his life before that."

RADON GAS IN HOMES: AN INDUSTRIALLY-INDUCED EPIDEMIC?

The Atomic Energy Control Board has announced adoption of radiation criteria for use in the investigation and cleanup of communities contaminated by radiation. The Government of British Columbia has adopted the AECB exposure limits [for public exposure to radon daughters]: ''The WLM unit is not appropriate for exposures in the home or in other non-occupational situations. In such situations the maximum permissible annual average concentration of radon daughters (attributable to the operation of a nuclear facility) shall be 0.02 WL.'' [Outdoor] levels higher than 0.02 WL may be produced locally by uranium mines. Higher outdoor concentrations would obviously produce higher indoor concentrations of radon. [According to Dr. Wagoner:] "On the basis of additional data, the EPA [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] has estimated that 110 to 230 extra lung cancer deaths would occur among 100,000 population with a lifetime residency at ambient levels of radon daughter exposure (i.e. 0.004 WL). "In contrast, 2000 to 3000 extra lung cancer deaths per 100,000 population were estimated to occur over a lifetime indoor radon daughter exposure to 0.02 WL ." In light of the present state of knowledge, one could well view the allowable exposure to the public from nuclear facilities as tantamount to allowing an industrially-induced epidemic of cancer. Dr. Radford in his submission to the Commission stated that "epidemiological and experimental evidence indicates that alpha radiation [from radon] is more effective (per unit dose) in producing cancer when exposure is at low dose rates over long periods of time, than when the equivalent dose is given at a high rate for short periods of time."Dr. Archer observed that "Alpha radiation [from radon] appears to be approximately eight times as efficient at 100 WLM as at 1000 WLM. This data makes it highly likely that radon daughter levels in residences are responsible for some lung cancers." In 1971, the joint monograph by NIOSH [U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health] and NIEHS [U.S. National Institute for Environmental Health Studies] also noted: "The risk of respiratory cancer per unit of exposure appeared to be greater in the lower cumulative radiation groups than in the higher ones -- i.e. an assumption of linearity appears not to be conservative [it may well under-estimate the actual risks]." Nevertheless, the AECB assumes that this [linear hypothesis] "is a cautious assumption; i.e. the number of cancer cases will probably be overestimated."

AN OPEN LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE British Columbia Medical Association
13 January 1984
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:
As there appears to be some confusion among representatives of industry and government with respect to the British Columbia Medical Association's efforts as a major participant in the British Columbia Royal Commission of Inquiry, Health and Environmental Protection Uranium Mining, we wish to make the following comments:
Dr Eric R Young and Dr Robert F Woollard participated as interveners at the Inquiry as representatives of this Association.
Dr Young is presently the chairman of the environmental health committee of the BCMA and Dr Woollard is past-chairman.
During the Inquiry the BCMA was privileged to present statements of evidence of internationally-recognized authorities on various aspects of this issue.
The report entitled "The Health Dangers of Uranium Mining and Jurisdictional Questions" authored by Drs Young and Woollard is the summary argument of the BCMA presented in 1980 to the Royal Commission in response to its call for final arguments from participants in the inquiry. As such it has been supported by the BCMA Executive and Board of Directors.
This report has had significant peer review and there has been ample opportunity for public comment.
The substance of the report is reflective of BCMA policies in the area of environmental health as established over several years by consideration and debate at the general assembly and Board of Directors and, as confirmation of this, the BCMA holds copyright on both printings of this BCMA publication.
Extensive feedback has confirmed the report's value as an aid in promoting public participation in this important area of environmental health and has vindicated the medical association's expressed interest to raise the level of debate on this issue.
Yours sincerely
G D McPherson, MD
BCMA President

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:41 am

Child cancer risk higher near nuclear plants: study

December 8, 2007

http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNe ... 08?sp=true

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German study has found that young children living near nuclear power plants have a significantly higher risk of developing leukemia and other forms of cancer, a German newspaper reported on Saturday.

"Our study confirmed that in Germany a connection has been observed between the distance of a domicile to the nearest nuclear power plant .... and the risk of developing cancer, such as leukemia, before the fifth birthday," Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper quoted the report as saying.
The newspaper said the study was done by the University of Mainz for Germany's Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BFS). A copy of the report was not immediately available.

The researchers found that 37 children within a 5-kilometer (3-mile) radius of nuclear power plants had developed leukemia between 1980 and 2003, while the statistical average during this time period was 17, the paper said.

The newspaper cited an unnamed radiation protection expert familiar with the study who said its conclusions understated the problem. He said the data showed there was an increased cancer risk for children living within 50 kilometers of a reactor.

German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel said in a statement that he would examine the study. He said the BFS should also evaluate its findings.

Germany plans to prematurely shut down all of its nuclear power plants by the early 2020s.

(Reporting by Louis Charbonneau)

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Child cancer risk higher near nuclear plants: study

January 25, 2008

http://politicsnpoetry.wordpress.com/2008/01/

Filed under: AECL, Germany, Nuclear Power, Uranium, activism, children's health, nuclear — politicsnpoetry @ 12:11 pm

This is something not carried on major newscasts when it was released in December 2007.

Of course, Canada had its own nuclear issues going on then.

From the inbox: Gordon Edwards wrote:

I have been told that this German study was carefully carried out with a very large population living in the vicinity of 16 nuclear power plants. According to my source, there was a statistically significant correlation between cancer/leukemia among children under 5 and their proximity to (or distance from) a nuclear power plant. Moreover, this correlation remained significant when any one nuclear plant was taken away and the other 15 were studied. Thus the results are the strongest ever obtained, and the methodology was, according to all reports, exemplary.

--------------

Child cancer risk higher near nuclear plants: study

http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNe ... 08?sp=true Sat Dec 8, 2007

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German study has found that young children living near nuclear power plants have a significantly higher risk of developing leukemia and other forms of cancer, a German newspaper reported on Saturday.

“Our study confirmed that in Germany a connection has been observed between the distance of a domicile to the nearest nuclear power plant …. and the risk of developing cancer, such as leukemia, before the fifth birthday,” Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper quoted the report as saying.
The newspaper said the study was done by the University of Mainz for Germany’s Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BFS). A copy of the report was not immediately available.

The researchers found that 37 children within a 5-kilometer (3-mile) radius of nuclear power plants had developed leukemia between 1980 and 2003, while the statistical average during this time period was 17, the paper said.

The newspaper cited an unnamed radiation protection expert familiar with the study who said its conclusions understated the problem. He said the data showed there was an increased cancer risk for children living within 50 kilometers of a reactor.

***The statement of the expert external panel is here.
***The background to the study is here.

Ed. NOTE: ***Unfortunately, these Links are no longer active.
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S.C. researchers find more leukemia in children, young people near nukes

http://www.southernstudies.org/2007/07/ ... ia-in.html July 2007

A new study by researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina has found elevated rates of leukemia among children and young people living near nuclear facilities.

The findings raise important questions about the push to expand the U.S. nuclear power industry. There are currently plans (PDF) to build new reactors across the nation and the South, including Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

The MUSC researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 17 research papers covering 136 nuclear sites in the United States, United Kingdom, Spain, Japan, Germany and France. They found that leukemia death rates for children up to the age of 9 were elevated by between 5 and 24 percent, depending on their proximity to nuclear facilities, and by 2 to 18 percent in children and young people up to the age of 25. They also found that leukemia incidence rates were increased among those living near nuclear facilities by 14 to 21 percent in children up to age 9, and by 7 to 10 percent for those up to age 25.

"Childhood leukemia is a rare disease and nuclear sites are commonly found in rural areas, which means that sample sizes tend to be small," says lead author Dr. Peter J. Baker. "The advantage of carrying out a meta-analysis is that it enables us to draw together a number of studies that have employed common methods and draw wider conclusions."

Eight separate analyses were performed -- including unadjusted, random and fixed-effect models -- and the figures they produced showed considerable consistency.

"If the amount of exposure were too low to cause the excess risk, we would expect leukemia rates to remain consistent before and after the start-up of a nuclear facility," said Baker. "However, our meta-analysis consistently showed elevated illness and death rates for children and young people living near nuclear facilities."

Baker noted that many questions remain to be answered about why living near a nuclear reactor would increase leukemia rates. Various hypotheses have been proposed to explain the phenomenon, including environmental radiation exposure and parental radiation exposure. In addition, cancer researcher Professor Leo Kinlen of Oxford University has offered the hypothesis that viral transmission caused by mixing populations in a new rural location could be a factor.

"It is clear that further research is needed into this important subject," Baker concluded.

The MUSC study appears in the July issue of the European Journal of Cancer Care.

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Radiation and Public Health Project, November 11, 2008

CHILD LEUKEMIA DEATH RATES RISING NEAR U.S. NUCLEAR PLANTS

http://www.ecologyparty.org/NoNukes01.html

[Rachel's introduction: A new study finds that the death rate from leukemia has risen during the past 2 decades among children living near nuclear power plants in the U.S. Similar findings have been reported previously from Europe.] Leukemia death rates in U.S. children near nuclear reactors rose sharply (compared to the national trend) in the past two decades, according to a new study. The greatest mortality increases occurred near the oldest nuclear plants, while declines were observed near plants that closed permanently in the 1980s and 1990s. The study was published in the most recent issue of the European Journal of Cancer Care. The study updates an analysis conducted in the late 1980s by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). That analysis, mandated by Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA), is the only attempt federal officials have made to examine cancer rates near U.S. nuclear plants. U.S. Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-MA), a senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said, "Nothing is more important to American families than the health of their children. It is critical that we continue to improve our understanding of the causes of child leukemia and learn how this heartbreaking disease be prevented, therefore this study deserves critical consideration." Actor and advocate Alec Baldwin said "exposure to ambient levels of radiation near nuclear reactors used by public utilities has long been suspected as a significant contributor to various cancers and other diseases." Baldwin, who has a long-standing interest in radiation health issues, adds "nuclear power is not the clean, efficient energy panacea to which we are presently being reintroduced. It is dirty, poses serious security threats to our country, and is ridiculously expensive. Nukes are still a military technology forced on the American public with a dressed up civilian application." Study authors were epidemiologist Joseph Mangano MPH MBA, Director of the Radiation and Public Health Project, and toxicologist Janette Sherman MD of the Environmental Institute at Western Michigan University. They analyzed leukemia deaths in children age 0-19 in the 67 counties near 51 nuclear power plants that started operations during the period 1957-1981 (the same counties in the NCI study). About 25 million people live in these 67 counties, and the 51 plants represent nearly half of all U.S. nuclear reactors).

Using mortality statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Mangano and Sherman found that in 1985-2004, the change in local child leukemia mortality (vs. the U.S.) compared to the earliest years of reactor operations were:
** An increase of 13.9% near nuclear plants started 1957-1970 (oldest plants)
** An increase of 9.4% near nuclear plants started 1971-1981 (newer plants)
** A decrease of 5.5% near nuclear plants started 1957-1981 and later shut down. The 13.9% rise near the older plants suggests a potential effect of greater radioactive contamination near aging reactors, while the 5.5% decline near closed reactors suggests a link between less contamination and lower leukemia rates. The large number of child leukemia deaths in the study (1292) makes many of the results statistically significant. The Mangano/Sherman report follows a 2007 meta-analysis also published in the European Journal of Cancer Care by researchers from the Medical University of South Carolina. That report reviewed 17 medical journal articles on child leukemia rates near reactors, and found that all 17 detected elevated rates.

A January 2008 European Journal of Cancer article that found high rates of child leukemia near German reactors from 1980-2003 is believed to be the largest study on the topic (1592 leukemia cases). The carcinogenic effects of radiation exposure are most severe among infants and children. Leukemia is the type of childhood cancer most closely associated with exposures to toxic agents such as radiation, and has been most frequently studied by scientists. In the U.S., during the period 1975-2005, leukemia incidence among children younger than 15 rose 54.6% (from 3.3 per 100,000 to 5.1 per 100,000), according to the National Cancer Institute,[1] suggesting that more detailed studies of causes are warranted.

==============
The Radiation and Public Health Project is a non profit group of health professionals and scientists based in New York that studies health risks from radioactive exposures to nuclear reactors and weapons tests. RPHP members have published 23 medical journal articles on the topic.

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Childhood Leukemia in the Vicinity of Nuclear Power Plants in Germany

Dtsch Arztebl Int 2008; 105(42): 725-32
DOI: 10.3238/arztebl.2008.0725
Kaatsch, P; Spix, C; Jung, I; Blettner, M
Original article

Author Affiliations:
Institut für Medizinische Biometrie, Epidemiologie und Informatik, Klinikum der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz: Dr. rer. physiol. Kaatsch, PD Dr. rer. nat. Spix, Jung, Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Blettner
Introduction: The causes of leukemia are largely unclear. The question whether leukemia rates are increased near nuclear power plants is controversial. The German Childhood Cancer Registry has published an epidemiological case-control study on childhood cancer and nuclear power plants.

Method: The study was based on the distance of children's residences from nuclear power plants and addressed the question whether children under age 5 with cancer live closer, on average, to nuclear power plants than randomly selected controls. Odds Ratios (OR) for distance categories and standardized incidence ratios (SIR) were calculated.

Results: An association was found between the nearness of residence to nuclear power plants and the risk of leukemia (593 cases, 1766 controls). Within the 5-km zone, the OR for the development of leukemia in children under 5 years of age was 2.19 compared to the rest of the region, and this elevation of the OR was statistically significant. The incidence of leukemia in the overall study region was the same as that in Germany as a whole (SIR=0.99; 95% confidence interval 0.92–1.07).

Discussion: Based on the available information about radiation emissions from German nuclear power plants, a direct relation to radiation seems implausible. Many factors may conceivably cause leukemia, possibly operating in combination, and these factors may be present to a greater extent in the vicinity of German nuclear power plants.

Dtsch Arztebl Int 2008; 105(42): 725–32
DOI: 10.3238/arztebl.2008.0725
Key words: child health, leukemia, nuclear power plants, epidemiology, cancer registry

Every year some 1800 children under 15 years of age in Germany develop a malignant disease, including around 600 who become ill with leukemia (1). The data of the German Childhood Cancer Registry show that a high proportion (79.1%) of cases in this age group are accounted for by acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), followed by acute myeloid leukemia (AML; 14.0%) (1). Chronic leukemia is considerably less frequent in children than in adults. The median age at onset is 5 years. The incidence of ALL in Germany is 4.1 per 100 000, that of AML 0.7 per 100 000. European data show a statistically significant increase in childhood leukemias in recent years (1978 to 1997: mean 0.6% per year) (2). This is confirmed by the German data (3).

The higher incidence of childhood leukemias in industrialized countries, together with repeated observations of temporally limited local clusters of leukemia in rural areas, has led to the hypothesis that infectious pathogens play a part (4). Children whose immune system was inadequately modulated in infancy seem to be at greater risk of leukemia when they later have increased exposure to agents of infection (5). Environmental influences were long suspected of causing a large proportion of leukemias in children; however, it has since emerged that only a small number of cases result from such factors. The authors published a review of the possible causes of childhood leukemia in 2005 (6).

Despite the great number of large epidemiological studies carried out, the causes of leukemia in childhood remain largely unclear. Nevertheless, one factor generally accepted to represent a risk for leukemia is exposure to ionizing radiation. The effect of low-dose radiation is less clear. Therefore, the question frequently arises of whether the risk of leukemia is greater in the vicinity of nuclear power plants (NPP).

Leukemia, especially in children, is usually a central topic in the discussion of the possible consequences of nuclear technology. This is related to the relatively swift development of leukemia after exposure to ionizing radiation and the fact that leukemia is the most frequent malignant disease of childhood.

In 2007 the German Childhood Cancer Registry published the findings of the Epidemiological Case-Control Study of Childhood Cancer and Nuclear Power Plants (KiKK study) (7–9). Earlier studies were completed and published in 1992 (10, 11) and 1998/1999 (12, 13). The question the recent study sets out to answer was whether children with cancer lived, on average, closer to an NPP than randomly selected healthy control children. Specifically, it was investigated whether there is a connection between the distance from residence to nearest NPP and the occurrence of a malignant disease (formulated statistically as a one-sided proposition).

In the KiKK study, as in the preceding studies, an increased risk of leukemia was observed for children under the age of 5 years who live within 5 km of an NPP. In light of the available data on the radiation emitted by German power reactors during normal operation, however, a direct link with the radiation seems implausible on the basis of current knowledge.

In this article the authors report the results of a series of analyses extending beyond the original evaluation concept and the concluding report (tables 1, 2, 3), as well as additional analyses solely on the basis of data from the German Childhood Cancer Registry (tables 4, 5).

Materials and methods

The methods of the KiKK study are described in detail elsewhere and are therefore outlined only briefly here (box gif ppt) (7, 9). The KiKK study was a case-control study. A total of 41 administrative districts (Landkreise) in the vicinity of 16 NPP in western Germany were defined as the study region (figure gif ppt). Cases, as defined in the study, were all the children under 5 years of age diagnosed with a malignant disease (definition: [14]) between 1980 and 2003 who lived in the study region at the time of diagnosis and whose cases were notified to the German Childhood Cancer Registry (15). Altogether there were 1592 children with malignant diseases, including 593 with leukemia. Two NPP, Lingen and Emsland, were built at the same site with different operating periods; thus, the study region comprised 15 sites with 16 NPP.

Results - KiKK study

The KiKK study showed that in Germany a relationship can be observed between proximity of residence to an NPP and the risk that a child will develop cancer before reaching 5 years of age. This connection, statistically confirmed in this study, holds only for the leukemias; for all other previously established diagnoses (brain tumors, embryonal tumors), no statistically significant results were found.

Table 1 (gif ppt) shows the odds ratios (OR) for leukemia as a whole and its subgroups for the categories up to 5 km and up to 10 km. Within the 5-km zone the risk of leukemia is twice that elsewhere in the study region (OR = 2.19); for the 10-km zone the OR = 1.33. For table 2 (gif ppt) the zone of the study region more than 70 km from the nearest NPP was selected for comparison (reference category). An increased—albeit not statistically significant—OR of 2.27 can be seen for the 5-km zone, while in all other, more distant zones of the study region the OR lies between 0.90 (50- to 70-km zone) and 1.11 (30- to 50-km zone), with no distance trend discernible.

Time-dependent odds ratios and the influence of the "Krümmel region"
The KiKK study embraced the period from 1980 to 2003. The first NPP study covered the years 1980 to 1990, while the second took place in the period 1991 to 1995. The current third study additionally included the years 1996 to 2003; thus only some of the data are "new."

Table 3 (gif ppt) shows the OR for these three consecutive periods for the 5-km zone around the NPP (leukemia: OR = 3.00 for 1980 to 1990, OR = 2.10 for 1991 to 1995 [both statistically significant], OR = 1.78 for 1996 to 2003).

Since 1990 considerably more children than would be expected have developed leukemia around the NPP at Krümmel, Schleswig-Holstein. Intensive investigations have failed to identify a reason. From 1990 to 2006, 16 cases of leukemia were detected in children under 15 years of age in the communities of Geesthacht and Elbmarsch. Up to 2003 (the end of the KiKK study period) there were 14 cases of leukemia. Eight of the children affected were under 5 years old at disease onset and living in the 5-km zone, and were therefore included in the KiKK study (table 3). Altogether, 30 children under the age of 5 from the study area around the NPP Krümmel (administrative districts Duchy of Lauenburg, Harburg, and Lueneburg) were included in the KiKK study ("Krümmel cases"). The result of dichotomous analysis with the border at 5 km changes only little if these 30 cases are left out of consideration: OR = 2.19 for 1980 to 2003 for all 16 NPP; OR = 1.96 without Krümmel (table 3).

Standardized incidence ratios (SIR) for the whole study region and individual NPP areas

Table 4 (gif ppt) shows the SIR for the whole study region and for the areas around the 15 NPP sites. Neither for the whole study region nor for the individual NPP areas was a statistically significant deviation from the national average observed. The overall SIR for all 41 administrative districts was 0.99 (CI 0.92 to 1.07). The SIR values varied from 0.85 to 1.21 for the 15 groups of administrative districts around the individual NPP sites.

Table 5 (gif ppt) shows SIR by distance from the center of the community to the nearest NPP. The SIR value for the 5-km zone was 1.41. The 95% CI spans 1, so this SIR is not statistically significantly increased. The SIR values for communities whose centers are more than 5 km from the nearest NPP (5 to 10 km, 10 to 30 km, 30 to 50 km, 50 to 70 km, over 70 km) were statistically insignificant; they lay between 0.85 and 1.00.

Dividing the communities whose central points lay in the 5-km zone by type of settlement, the SIR was 1.81 (CI 0.73 to 3.72, based on 7 cases of disease) for rural localities, 1.18 (CI 0.69 to 1.90, 17 cases) for mixed settlements, and 1.71 (CI 0.82 to 3.14, 10 cases) for urban areas. None of these SIR values are statistically significantly elevated, and no trend is discernible (data not shown).

Evaluation of the case-control study showed a clear-cut increase in risk for cases from rural localities. Nevertheless, the estimator for the OR of the 5-km zone varied hardly at all after adjustment for these variables (2.21 vs 2.19). Thus the observed effect cannot be explained by the fact that NPP are preferably located in rural areas.

Discussion

The strength of the KiKK study lies in its consideration of all NPP regions of Germany collectively, enabling conclusions based on the greatest available number of relevant cases of disease. Notably, even after the pooling of all data, in the 24-year study period only 37 cases of leukemia in children under 5 within the 5-km zone were included in the evaluation (out of a total of 5893 cases of leukemia). Separate analysis for each individual NPP is therefore not meaningful with the selected study design.

The KiKK study has repeatedly been described as "the most painstakingly designed and most exhaustive survey worldwide" (e.g., press release of the Federal Office for Radiation Protection, 10 December 2007). This statement is not intended to conceal the fact that the present study, in common with almost all empirical, nonexperimental investigations, features potential distortions and limitations that can be clearly enumerated and must be taken into consideration when evaluating the findings. Some have already been described by Schulze-Rath et al. (17). Compared with the earlier incidence studies, the new case-control study has a different method with different disadvantages. Some important limitations of the KiKK study are discussed below.

It must be realized that the data of the most recent study are not independent from the data of the two preceding studies by the German Childhood Cancer Registry and do not constitute independent confirmation of the findings of earlier German studies. Increased incidence in the immediate vicinity of power reactors leads both to an increased SIR for communities in the area concerned (the approach of the first two incidence studies and the new analysis in table 5) and to an increased OR in the case-control design. Thus, the OR of 3.00 for 1980 to 1990 (table 3) corresponds to the almost identical relative risk from the first NPP study (RR = 3.01) (8). The limitation of the study to children under 5 years of age and the determination of the predefined subsidiary issues for investigation with regard to the 5-km zone and the subgroup of leukemia were based on the corresponding findings of the first NPP study (10, 11). The OR values in table 3 show a slightly decreasing tendency for the two periods after 1980 to 1990, to which the region around the NPP Krümmel made an essential contribution.

In case-control studies the nonresponse problem can lead to distortion of the results. Thus, in the most recent study the authors depended on the assistance of local authorities to recruit controls. Not all of them cooperated, the willingness to help varying according to the distance from the NPP. The consequences of this incomplete and sometimes error-prone recruitment of controls were, as far as possible with the available data, described in detail in sensitivity analyses in the concluding report (9). These problems with control recruitment may have led to slight overestimation of the effect.

The decision to base the study region on the boundaries of administrative districts led to anomalies. For instance, any town that constituted its own administrative unit rather than being part of a district was not included, regardless of its proximity to the NPP concerned. Administrative districts have irregular boundaries, leading to inclusion of some communities very far from an NPP and exclusion of other communities that were much closer.

In none of the three NPP studies could confounders be taken into account. In the incidence studies, only the type of community was considered as potential influencing factor. The most recent study stratified individually by age, sex, year, and NPP area. A supplementary analysis also examined the influence of community type. Consideration of other potential confounders (e.g., social status) was categorically excluded in the earlier studies, and they were also not investigated in the KiKK study, for the reasons detailed in the concluding report (9).

In both study types (incidence studies, case-control study), only the residential address at the time of diagnosis was used to determine distance; previous addresses were disregarded. Moreover, no information is available as to whether or for how long the children actually resided at that address before the onset of illness (extended visits to grandparents, time spent in crèches, with child minders, in kindergarten, on holiday, etc.). However accurate the individual distance determination, it may therefore not reflect the true "exposure" to the NPP.

The problem of interpreting distance as a measure of radiation exposure is shared by all three NPP studies. No data on radiation exposure were available; in particular, the natural background exposure was not taken into account. The variation in natural radiation exposure in Germany is many times higher than the radiation exposure from an NPP in normal operation.

The modeling of a constant distance curve has statistical advantages over categorical models (18, 19). On the other hand, it carries the inherent risk that a function will be fitted that only partly reflects the true trend of the data. This holds particularly when the distribution of the exposed probands tends to be uneven. Furthermore, certain basic assumptions cannot be disregarded in the modeling. It is particularly important to ensure that the observed data, by definition, do not include any "nonexposed" probands. In other words, the curve assigns an "exposure-dependent risk" to every individual, regardless of distance. It therefore makes sense, for example, to calculate attributable cases only for the range of distance with a genuinely clear effect. Attributable cases are cases that—assuming causality—could be put down to residing in the vicinity of an NPP. Derivation from the complete fitted curve is mathematically feasible, but implies the assumption that a quantitatively relevant "effect" persists right to the outer margin of the study area. This cannot be substantiated by the categorical analyses. These aspects were not taken into consideration in the critical discussion of the authors' evaluation of the study, a theme also taken up in the pages of Deutsches Ärzteblatt (20).

Not unexpectedly, in view of the topic, the public discussion has been heated and emotional (21). Thus, opinions differ as to whether the results indicate a causal relationship with the exposure to ionizing radiation from NPP. Based on the findings of radiation research such a connection seems implausible, because the radiation emitted by an NPP in normal operation is at least 1000 times lower than "background radiation," i.e., the 1.4 mSv of natural radiation to which the average German is exposed in a year (22). This comparison is based on a report commissioned by the European Union (23), which gives cumulative lifetime exposure of 0.0003200 to 0.0000019 mSv for a 50-year-old person living within 5 km of a German NPP. In their interpretation of the data, the authors assume normal operation of the NPP. The authors do not know to what extent incidents involving leakage of radiation may have occurred. No major incidents in Germany are known.

In May 2008 an international workshop on the causes of childhood leukemia, co-organized by the Federal Office for Radiation Protection, was held in Berlin. Participants emphasized that many different factors are involved in the etiology and that a simple monocausal interpretation of the present study's findings is not permissible (6, 24). Unfortunately, it cannot currently be ascertained whether several such factors occur together in the vicinity of German NPP, thus determining the study's findings. The authors' analyses show that living in a rural area is associated with a higher risk of leukemia, but this has no decisive influence on the main conclusion of the study.

After publication of the recent study, the authors were constantly approached by concerned citizens wanting to know whether it was dangerous to live in the area of an NPP and whether they should perhaps consider moving away. The SIR calculations for the KiKK study, presented here for the first time, are therefore of particular interest. For the whole study region they show almost exact agreement with the national incidence rate. The disease rates in the individual NPP areas fluctuate randomly above or below the national average, but the observed SIR values all lie within the statistical range of fluctuation. While one approach yields a striking result for the 5-km zone (OR = 2.19 [table 1]), the other approach gives a result which, though also increased, is not statistically significant (SIR = 1.41 [table 5]). Since the determination of distance using the central point of the community was much less exact than using individual residential addresses, as in the case-control study, a correspondingly less clear measure of effect was to be expected. In this respect the two approaches are not contradictory. Nevertheless, the disease rates, both for the individual NPP sites in the KiKK study with their associated groups of administrative districts and for the whole study region with all 16 NPP, were unremarkable (table 4). The central 5-km zones represent only a small fraction (<5%) of the total study region.

Acknowledgement

Thanks are due to all those who engaged themselves constructively and critically with the study and its conduct and supported the authors. Gratitude is owed to the authors' colleagues, the parents involved in the study's survey component, the local authority registration offices and data centers for providing addresses, and the Society for Paediatric Oncology and Haematology (GPOH) and its clinical studies, without which the high quality of the data in the German Childhood Cancer Registry would not be assured. The authors are particularly grateful to the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety and the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BfS) for financing the KiKK study (project no. StSch 4334) and to the Expert Commission of the BfS. The authors thank the Robert Koch Institute for conducting the study audit suggested by the Expert Commission and the Coordinating Center for Clinical Studies (KKS) of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Mainz, for checking their calculations. The authors expressly thank the following individuals: J. Michaelis and J. Schüz für scientific advice; the research assistants A. Mergenthaler, E. Münster, S. Schmiedel, and R. Schulze-Rath; the project assistants M. Kaiser, S. Kleinefeld, and C. Trübenbach; the student assistants J. Albrecht, C. Hornbach, and S.Weinand; and the interviewers A. Becht, B. Grossmann, B. Haupt, B. Krey, L. Krille, F. Müller, P. Quetsch, R. Schmunk, R. Tekie, and C. Varlik. They thank M. Ressing for looking through the manuscript and for constructive suggestions.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that no conflict of interest exists according to the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.

Manuscript received on 23 July 2008, revised version accepted on
18 September 2008.

Translated from the original German by David Roseveare.

Corresponding author
Dr. rer. physiol. Peter Kaatsch
Institut für medizinische Biometrie, Epidemiologie und Informatik
Klinikum der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
Obere Zahlbacher Str. 69
55131 Mainz, Germany
kaatsch@imbei.uni-mainz.de

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Elevated childhood cancer incidence proximate to U.S. nuclear power plants.

http://www.c-10.org/pdf/Elevated%20chil ... to%20U.pdf
Date: 2/1/2003
Author: Chang, Carolyn; Dave, Amie; Feinberg, Elyssa; Frimer, Marina; Mangano, Joseph J.; Sherman,

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Resolve health issues before building more nuke reactors

http://www.radiation.org/spotlight/0812 ... ibune.html

Joseph J. Mangano, MPH, MBA Guest Columnist Scranton Times Tribune Tuesday, December 3, 2008

Last month, PPL Corp. sent a letter to federal regulators, stating it planned to build a new nuclear reactor at Bell Bend, just a few miles from the Susquehanna plant where two reactors now operate. The new reactor would be the largest in the U.S., at 1600 megawatts electrical.

The new unit would begin operating in 2018 at the earliest, and its cost would be a staggering $15 billion, an amount that PPL could not cover without taxpayer assistance. This fall, PPL also applied for federal loan guarantees — even though the national “pot” is barely enough to cover the cost of a single reactor like Bell Bend.

As businessmen jockey over the financial future of the new reactor, the issue of public health risk has been largely overlooked. Even though the reactor would not emit greenhouse gases like a coal plant, is it safe? A logical way to answer the question would be to examine whether or not local rates of radiation-related cancer have risen since the two Susquehanna reactors started in the early 1980s.

Radiation exposure raises risk of all types of cancer, but some cancers are more strongly linked than others. In particular, the only known cause of thyroid cancer is exposure to radiation, according to many scientific studies. Radioactive iodine, one of the many chemicals produced only in atomic bombs and nuclear reactors, seeks out the thyroid, a butterfly-shaped gland in the neck, where it kills and injures cells, leading to cancer.

The local area east (downwind) of Susquehanna covers six counties in Pennsylvania and one in New Jersey, with 1.35 million residents. Official health statistics show an alarmingly high local rate of thyroid cancer. In 1999-2004, the seven-county rate was nearly double, or 95.2 percent greater, than the U.S. rate. The local rate of thyroid cancer is the highest of any metropolitan area in the nation, an astounding three to four times higher than in other parts of the nation.

No matter how the numbers are analyzed, local thyroid cancer is high. It’s high for men and women, for young, middle age, and old, year after year. No other cancer has such a high rate in the region. Thyroid cancer isn’t a rarity, as more than 200 local residents receive diagnosis each year. The area has a below-average poverty rate and has good access to medical care both locally and in Philadelphia and New York, so there is no obvious reason accounting for this pattern.

It’s certainly possible that radioactive iodine released from the Susquehanna reactors in the past quarter-century has harmed local residents. Even though we can’t be sure about this, there are precedent studies. Perhaps the most important one was done by a decade ago. After years of denial by government officials that atomic bomb test fallout had harmed humans, the National Cancer Institute and Institute of Medicine estimated that exposure to iodine in fallout caused as many as 212,000 Americans to develop cancer.

Orders for new nuclear reactors stopped in the U.S. in 1978 because of concerns over health and cost. Recently, utilities like PPL have made plans to start ordering reactors again, and 31 (including Bell Bend) have been proposed. Supporters of nuclear power often state that nuclear power is “clean” but in Northeast Pennsylvania, this should be given a long, hard look.

There should be no rush to build an expensive and quite possibly harmful nuclear reactor, until all health issues are studied and the public is informed of any risk. If local residents are already suffering, there is no need to add to their burden. The more prudent move would be to hold off on new nukes, and instead develop safe forms of electricity such as solar and wind power.

Joseph J. Mangano MPH MBA is Executive Director of the Radiation and Public Health Project, a research and education group based in New York.

The Radiation and Public Health Project (RPHP) http://www.radiation.org/index.html

For numerous articles re: health impacts on children living near nuclear power plants: http://www.radiation.org/press/index.html

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Risks of Cancer Living Near Nuclear Installations

Published in the Canora Courier on January 14, 2009

Dear Editor

Radiation exposure raises risk of all types of cancer. For example, radioactive iodine, one of the many chemicals produced in nuclear reactors, seeks out the thyroid gland where it kills and injures cells, leading to cancer. Radiation exposure also causes Childhood Leukemia. In ongoing research into the negative health impacts of nuclear power plants, the German Childhood Cancer Registry conducted a study in western Germany from 1980 to 2003 in a region containing 16 nuclear power plants.

This case-controlled study, entitled the Epidemiological Case-Control Study of Childhood Cancer and Nuclear Power Plants (KiKK Study), addressed the question whether children under age 5 with diagnosed cancer live closer, on average, to nuclear power plants than do randomly-selected controls.

In 2007, the KiKK Study published its findings, stating that there was an association between the nearness of residence to nuclear power plants and the risk of leukemia (1592 control cases, 593 with leukemia). It determined that within the 5 km zone, there was a statistically significant development of leukemia in children under 5 years of age and was twice that of elsewhere in the study region. The risk decreases as the distance living from the plants increases but, apparently, there are still increased risks living 50 km away from nuclear power plants.

Hopefully, people living anywhere near the site of Bruce Power’s proposed nuclear power plant ‘somewhere’ on the banks of the North Saskatchewan River will be aware of the needless risk of cancers, including leukemia in their offspring, this installation will present . . . for many generations to come.

Elaine Hughes
Archerwill, SK

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sent to Regina Leader-post for publishing on January 10, 2009

To the Editor

When there’s reasonable doubt. . . .

The most recent study, the case-controlled KiKK study (a German acronym for Childhood Cancer in the Vicinity of Nuclear Power Plants), to concern itself with the fear that children living near nuclear facilities face an increased risk of childhood leukemia, published its findings in 2008 in the International Journal of Cancer.

It found that there was a 60% increase in solid cancers and a 117% increase in leukemia among young children living near all 16 large German nuclear facilities between 1980 and 2003. (593 leukemia cases included in the control group of 1592 malignant cases)

Most strikingly, children living within 5 kms of the nuclear power plant (NPP) were more than twice as likely to contract cancer as those living further away, a finding accepted by the German government.

In his critique of this study, Reasonable Doubt (New Scientist, April 2008), author Ian Fairlie (a London-based consultant on radiation in the environment) asked:

- Should pregnant women and young children be advised to move away from NPPs?
- Should local residents eat vegetables from their gardens?
- Shouldn’t those governments around the world who are planning to build more reactors think again?

Saskatchewan residents, especially those living anywhere near the site of Bruce Power’s proposed $15 Billion nuclear power plant ‘somewhere’ along the North Saskatchewan River, must ask the Saskatchewan Government these same questions.

In the face of reasonable doubt, why would any responsible government, intentionally or through negligence, risk human life, especially that of their own young children?

Elaine Hughes
Archerwill, SK

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:43 am

Sent for publishing on September 9, 2008

Nuclear Radiation

To the Editor,

Nuclear radiation cannot be seen or felt, but that most certainly does not mean that it is clean and green when we process it in nuclear power plants The proponents and investors in uranium mining would like us to believe that nuclear is a safe alternative to rapidly depleting fossil fuels.

About 25 year ago, I had the privilege of attending a social justice workshop in Edmonton. As we queued for lunch, the little lady in front of me introduced herself as Sr. Rosalie Bertell. She was our guest teacher that day, giving us a basic understanding of nuclear radiation. Sr. Rosalie was already then known -- and still is -- as the anti nuclear nun. She is internationally recognized as an expert in low-level radiation and cancer. She has studied nuclear radiation extensively, written books on the subject, and was asked to share her knowledge with concerned people in many parts of the world. Her resume is just too long to enumerate in this letter; just look her up on the Internet.

But now we have hard evidence that Sr. Rosalie's fear of increased cancers due to the presence of nuclear reactors, is indeed a reality.

The Federal Office for Radiation Protection in Germany has released the results of a study of cancer rates in young children. This study was conducted between the years 1980 to 2003. It revealed that there was a 60% increase in solid cancers, and a 117% in leukemia in children up to 5 years of age, living within 5 km of 16 German nuclear reactors. It also found a 20 to 40 % increase in cancers in children living within a 50 km radius of the nuclear plants. All plants were deemed to be operating normally during the test period, with radiation releases that were well within the allowable limits for civilian populations.

Dr. Ernst Iskenius, a German pediatrician, will be in Saskatoon on the 29th of September speaking on the effects of low-level radiation on children.

Leo Kurtenbach,
Cudworth, Sask.,

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:48 am

Indian Doctors For Peace And Development (IDPD). 2007

Black Magic of Uranium at Jadugoda, Study of Health Status of Indigenous People Around Jadugoda Uranium Minies in India

http://www.nuwinfo.se:80/black-magic-at ... 7idpd.html

This 2007 report by the The Indian Doctors For Peace And Development (IDPD) (http://www.idpd.org/) documents the health effects on Indigenous people in India living in close proximity to a uranium mining operation. The study was carried out by a team of medical doctors using 34 trained fact-gatherers. Data was gathered from all the 2,118 households in five villages close to the mines, and was compared with data from all 1,904 households in villages 30-35 km away from the mines.

The statistically significant results show increases in congenital deformities, sterility, cancers, and shortened life span among those living close to the mines.

FULL REPORT at:

http://www.nuwinfo.se/files/black-magic ... 07idpd.pdf

Attachment Size - 3.4 MB

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:50 am

Why Nuclear Is Not Healthy for Human or Other Life

By Jim Harding, Ph.D. March 28, 2008

Prepared for “Medicine and Survival”, Physicians for Global Survival, Lake Couchiching, Ontario

At a 1977 IAEA conference on the Nuclear Fuel Cycle, U.S. nuclear scientist Alvin Weinberg commented: “…we nuclear scientists have not faced up to the full consequences of complete success. If we succeed in building tens of thousands of nuclear reactors…which we must do to make any noticeable dent in the world’s use of petroleum, we can expect to have a core meltdown approximately every four years. The lesson is clear. We must stop building these reactors near large cities.” Weinberg went on to recommend that large tracts of land be set aside exclusively for nuclear. From an ecological perspective which values biodiversity and bioregional responsibility, this advice from one of the nuclear industry’s most renowned supporters sounds more like a nightmare than a vision.

Complete article at:

http://forum.stopthehogs.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=636

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:52 am

Published in the Leader Post on October 9, 2007

Depleted Uranium: Enduring Risk

by John W. Warnock

Six years ago on October 7 the U.S. government launched a war against the government of Afghanistan. Air power was the key. Two B-2 Stealth bombers flew from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri, each carrying sixteen 2,0000-lb satellite directed bombs. Five B-1B and 10 B-52 heavy bombers flew from Diego Garcia, the U.S. island-base guarding the Persian Gulf. Twenty-five strike aircraft attacked from two U.S. aircraft carriers in the Arabian Sea. U.S. Navy F-18 Hornets and F-14 Tomcats dropped 500-lb guided bombs and 2,000-lb earth penetrators. Fifty Tomahawk cruise missiles were launched from U.S. and British ships and submarines. The targets for the first few days were military facilities, both those of the Taliban government and those used by Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda.

For the Tora Bora bunkers the U.S. Air Force allotted 32 individual GBU-31, 2,000-lb bombs, carried by the B-1 Lancer bombers, launched from the USA and from Diego Garcia. A single aircraft can carry up to 24 tons of bombs. The 5,000-lb bunker busters and the earth penetrator weapons were dropped by B-2 bombers. Within a few days the U.S. government announced that they had destroyed the main targets.

By October 29, 70% of U.S. air strikes were in support of the Northern Alliance armed forces, most guided by the U.S. Special Forces on the ground. The MQ-1 Predator drone with Hellfire missiles was operating over Taliban forces, directing air attacks and launching missiles. By the fifth of November the number of individual air missions was up to 120 per day, adding F-16 and F-15 fighter-bombers out of U.S. bases in Kuwait.

The turning point in the war to oust the Taliban government came on November 6 at Mazar-e Sharif, a key city in the northern plains. Attack aircraft rained down hundreds of MK82 500-lb bombs. B-52 bombers used carpet bombing to kill thousand of Taliban forces. It was here that U.S. forces dropped the first BLU-82 Daisy Cutter bomb, each weighing 15,000 lbs, producing devastation over a 600-yard radius. All the weapons used by the U.S. air attack included depleted uranium shielding.

Depleted uranium (DU) is produced during the uranium enrichment process. The U-235 used to produce fuel for reactors generating electricity is removed, leaving the U-238 isotope. The material is extremely dense and increases the penetration ability of weapons; it is used to coat shells and warheads on missiles and bombs. On impact the shell, with its uranium and traces of americium and plutonium, vaporizes and becomes very tiny particles of radioactive dust. When it is inhaled it can stay in the body, emitting radiation. The DU used in U.S. weapons comes from the uranium mines in Saskatchewan.

In the 1991 Gulf war DU was delivered almost exclusively with shells from tanks and ammunition used by aircraft. It is used in all armour piercing ordnance. In the wars in Bosnia in 1995 and Kosovo in 1999, NATO allies added DU missiles and bunker busting bombs. Thousands of DU bombs and missiles have been used by U.S. forces in the Afghan and Iraq wars. A typical bunker bomb contains 1.5 tonnes of depleted uranium.

In August 2003 Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor used a Geiger counter to test several sites in Bagdad near where bunker buster bombs and missiles had fallen. He found radiation readings which were between 1,000 and 1,900 times higher than normal background radiation readings. DU weapons are still being extensively used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

After the 1991 Gulf War, birth defects and leukemia rose dramatically in the areas around Basra where these weapons were used. By 2003 the U.S. Defense Department admitted that over 200,000 Gulf War veterans had filed for compensation for death, illness or disabilities. The veterans refer to this as “Gulf War Syndrome.” In the first Gulf War, the U.S.-led coalition suffered 148 deaths. Since then 8,000 veterans of this war have experienced early death.

In 1996 the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring that DU weapons were illegal “weapons of mass destruction.” In 2002 the U.N. Human Rights Convention passed a resolution urging a ban on the use of any DU weapons. We will have to wait to find out the impact of these weapons on the people of Afghanistan and the men and women in the U.S., Canadian and NATO armed forces.

John W. Warnock is a Regina political economist and author. This is an extract from his forthcoming book, Afghanistan: The Creation of a Failed State, to be published by Fernwood in 2008.

John W. Warnock
2156 Retallack St.
Regina, SK
S4T 2K4
(306) 352-5282
http://www.johnwarnock.ca

"It is easier to perceive error than to find truth, for error lies on the surface while truth lies in the depths, where few are willing to search for it." Goethe

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 9:54 am

Chernobyl 20 Years On

ECRR - Chernobyl: 20 Years On

Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident European Committee on Radiation Risk

Documents of the ECRR 2006 No1

Edited by C.C.Busby and A.V.Yablokov

The report, Chernobyl 20 years on, is available on-line, now.

The cover-up after the Chernobyl reactor explosion, has been systemic.

The International Atomic Energy Agency and others involved in promoting the use of nuclear power for civilian and military means have been exposed in this book.

Here is the link:

http://www.euradcom.org/publications/chernobylebook.pdf

It is 259 pages of scientific and statistical data put together by independent researchers

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:01 am

A DOCTOR'S JOURNAL: Navajo Miners Battle a Deadly Legacy of Yellow Dust

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.h ... sec=health

May 13, 2003 By BEN DAITZ, M.D.

I drove west across an ocher sagebrush plain, past pinto ponies grazing next to a Pentecostal revival tent, past the ribbed, rutted dirt road that leads north to Chaco Canyon, the sacred, ancestral home of the Anasazi, the ancient ones.

I was on the eastern edge of the vast Navajo Reservation, heading toward Crownpoint, a Navajo community of almost 3,000 people astride the Continental Divide about 100 miles northwest of Albuquerque. It is the administrative and educational hub of the Eastern Navajo Agency and the site of the Indian Health Service Hospital.

The Crownpoint I.H.S. hospital serves more than 20,000 Navajo who live in small communities and isolated traditional hogans across the high desert of northwestern New Mexico. I was driving to the Crownpoint Hospital to meet my good friend John Fogarty, a medical officer in the Indian Health Service. The Navajo in these parts call John the uranium doctor.

The Diné (pronounced dee-NAY) or ''the People,'' as the Navajo call themselves, have many stories about their origins. One says that as they emerged from the fourth world into the fifth and present world, they were given the choice of two yellow powders. One yellow powder was corn pollen, and that was the one they chose.

The other was the color of the dust that seems to give this land its golden hue, dust the color of yellowcake, the uranium oxide that fueled the nuclear age. So much yellowcake lies below the surface that a mining executive called this place the Saudi Arabia of uranium.

The Spirits said it had to be left alone. But from the late 1940's through the mid-80's, yellowcake was picked and shoveled and blasted and hauled in open-bed trucks, and then dried in mountainous piles at multiple sites in the American West. The Navajo, whose lands extend over western New Mexico, eastern Arizona and southern Utah, were at the epicenter of the uranium-mining boom, and thousands of Navajos worked in the mines. More than 1,000 abandoned mine shafts remain on Navajo land.

The consequences are measured today, decades after the mines closed, in continuing health problems and degraded land.

Under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act of 1990, people exposed to radiation through uranium mining and milling or through weapons testing are eligible for government compensation.

On that recent day, Dr. Fogarty and Dr. Bruce Strumminger were conducting a clinic for former Navajo uranium miners, most in their 70's and 80's. Dr. Strumminger, also a physician for the Indian Health Service, is medical director of the Radiation Exposure Screening Education Program at the health service hospital in Shiprock, N.M., 100 miles northwest of Crownpoint. He told me that four uranium miners' health clinics screened 3,000 to 4,000 miners in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah.

More than 500 uranium miners died of lung cancer from 1950 to 1990. Hundreds more will die of lung cancer in the coming years, a study by the Public Health Service predicts. A majority of the deaths stemmed from exposure to radiation from the breakdown of uranium products. These so-called radon daughters attach to dust particles, and when workers inhale the dust, the particles lodge in their lungs, where they release high doses of radiation.

Navajo uranium miners run a risk of developing lung cancer that is 28 times as great as those Navajos not exposed to uranium, according to a study in The Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Thomas Desiderio was the first patient of the day. Mr. Desiderio, 75, handsome with short-cropped gray hair, wore jeans, a Western shirt and a big smile. His wife sat by his side in her wide pleated Navajo skirt, her hair coiled in a bun at her neck.

The Desiderios are accompanied by Trudy James, a caseworker with Dr. Strumminger's clinic, who is a patient's advocate and a translator. Like many Navajos in the Eastern Agency, the Desiderios do not speak English well, and the clinic doctors' questions are interpreted and reinterpreted in their complex sonorous language, which was used as a secret code in World War II.

The miners' compensation is determined by their health status and work histories, how long they worked underground and where. They fill out 22-page applications.

Mr. Desiderio tells us he worked off and on in the mines from 1953 to 1981 in a variety of jobs. Many miners worked in ''dog holes,'' primitive tunnels with no ventilation that men crawled through to dig uranium ore by hand. ''Mom-and-pop operations,'' Dr. Strumminger calls them.

The larger mines were frequently no better, with substandard ventilation, no face masks for workers and little or no information or education about the long-term health risks.

Mr. Desiderio's overall exposure has been calculated at 94 working-level months; 40 is the minimum for compensation. The physicians listened to his heart and lungs, working down his chest with dual stethoscopes. ''How far can you walk without getting short of breath?'' Dr. Fogarty asked.

Ms. James translated the question and the reply. Mr. Desiderio said he could walk 30 miles in elk hunting season. His wife said he had to stop every 10 feet to catch his breath.

Mr. Desiderio has not yet qualified for the $150,000 compensation. Although his blood oxygen concentration is low, showing some lung damage, his last chest X-ray did not show enough chronic changes in his lungs to support his claim fully.

''Why is this taking so long?'' Mr. Desiderio finally asked in broken English. ''Why haven't we been paid?''

The doctors will order a special X-ray, to be read by a radiologist trained to interpret the subtle changes of pneumoconiosis, the chronic nonmalignant respiratory disease common to underground miners who inhale rock dust. The death rate among Navajo miners from respiratory diseases like pneumoconiosis and emphysema is also extremely high, about the same as the death rate from lung cancer.

The next patient, John James, 67, started mining underground in 1956 in Moab, Utah. Then he went to Ambrosia Lake, N.M., and on to the Homestake mine in Grants, N.M.

''We brought dust home on our clothes,'' he told the doctors. ''We contaminated our families. I saw the yellowcake there. It looked like it was burning.''

''He means glowing,'' said Ms. James, who is not related.

Mr. James is on home oxygen. He said that two weeks ago he coughed up some blood. Dr. Strumminger ordered a chest X-ray and drew an arterial blood gas to check the oxygen-carrying capacity. He said Mr. James's arterial blood gas result plus the chronic disease changes on his chest X-ray would probably qualify him for compensation.

The doctors saw six patients that morning. Most of the old miners drove at least 100 miles to get there, and they will keep returning for testing, betting that the sad chapter of their past will somehow compensate them for the present, before they die.

No one is mining uranium here now. But Dr. Fogarty and Dr. Strumminger are worried about plans to resume it.

Hydro Resources Inc., a subsidiary of Uranium Resources Inc. of Dallas, wants to begin a new mining effort in Crownpoint and nearby Church Rock using a process called in situ leach mining. In the process, a mixture of water, dissolved oxygen and sodium bicarbonate is pumped deep into underground uranium beds. The mixture dissolves uranium, and when the liquid is pumped back to the surface, the uranium can be removed, dried and processed.

The water for the leaching would come from the Westwater Canyon Aquifer under Crownpoint, the sole source of drinking water for Crownpoint and its surrounding area.

Hydro Resources plans to provide uranium for the nuclear power industry, create jobs and leave the aquifer safe for drinking.

But Dr. Fogarty and Dr. Strumminger are worried. Dr. Fogarty wrote his thesis for his master's in public health on the health risks of uranium mining. Underground mining led to lung disease, he said, but if leach mining pollutes the aquifer, a result may be widespread kidney disease.

''The Navajo are more vulnerable to the toxic kidney effects of uranium,'' he said, ''because they already have three times the national rates of diabetes and kidney disease.''

When he heard about the leaching plan, Mitchell Capitan, a former mining technician, became an opponent. Mr. Capitan is president of the Crownpoint chapter of the Eastern Navajo Agency, the Navajo equivalent of a mayor, and he founded Endaum, Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining.

''The aquifer right underneath us provides water for 15,000 people,'' he said, standing on an outcrop on the western edge of Crownpoint. He pointed to the leaching site and said:

''People come here from all over these parts, from 50 miles away, to truck this water back to their houses, to drink it, because it's the only pure supply. Their own water is bad -- contaminated.''

Later, Mr. Capitan made his case to a gathering in the cafeteria of the Crownpoint elementary school. The cafeteria walls were painted with scenes of sheepherders and red rock mesas, with hawks floating above.

The occasion was the opening of the Water Is Life conference, sponsored by Endaum. A woman gently waving a sage incense bundle circulated through the audience. Old women in traditional velvet skirts and turquoise pendants and young Navajo men and women, about 100 people from all over the reservation, were there to talk about the future of water in their high desert environment.

The unemployment rate in the area is almost 70 percent, but there is little sentiment that mining jobs are worth the risk. Endaum has the support of all 31 chapters in the Eastern Navajo Agency Council, as well as the new president of the Navajo Nation, Joe Shirley Jr.

In alternating Navajo and English, Mr. Capitan explained how Endaum had obtained a moratorium against leach mining -- with the help of the Southwest Research and Information Center, an environmental advocacy group, and the New Mexico Environmental Law Center -- until a hearing has been completed before a judge for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The groups expect a decision soon.

Mr. Capitan stood under an Endaum banner. In Navajo and English, it said, ''One Mind, One Voice, One Prayer, One People.''

''This uranium impacts on our water, our air and our cultural identity,'' he said. ''We've already had enough uranium.''

Dr. Fogarty put it another way: ''This decision should not come down to which hydrologist the N.R.C. believes. When you think about the history of uranium here, what it did to these people, the N.R.C. should support the people's health, first and foremost.''

Ben Daitz is a professor at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:08 am

Greenpeace releases health study of 1986 nuclear accident...Chernobyl death toll enormously underestimated

http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/pre ... r-accident

Greenpeace Canada, 18 Apr 06 - A new Greenpeace report, with input from 52 scientists from around the world, reveals that official estimates of the health impact from the Chernobyl catastrophe have been hugely under-estimated by the United Nationsí International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

18 April 2006 Chernobyl Health Report

http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/doc ... lth-report

The difficult truth about the Chernobyl catastrophe : the worst effects are still to come.

18 April 2006 Chernobyl Report

http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/doc ... byl-report

Twenty years have passed since the worst nuclear reacotr accident in the world occured at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine. The radioactive contamination wich resulted from the explosion and fire in the first few days spread over large areas of neighbouring Belarus and the Russian Federation , with most of the fallout in Belarus.

by **Oscar** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 10:19 am

Child Leukemia Rates Increase Near U.S. Nuclear Power Plants

http://www.salem-news.com/articles/may1 ... -18-09.php

Salem-News.com May-18-2009

The carcinogenic effects of radiation exposure are most severe among infants and children.

(NEW YORK) - Leukemia death rates in U.S. children near nuclear reactors rose sharply (vs. the national trend) in the past two decades, according to a recent study.

The greatest mortality increases occurred near the oldest nuclear plants, while declines were observed near plants that closed permanently in the 1980s and 1990s. The study was published in the most recent issue of the European Journal of Cancer Care.

The study updates an analysis conducted in the late 1980s by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). That analysis, mandated by Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA), is the only attempt federal officials have made to examine cancer rates near U.S. nuclear plants.

U.S. Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-MA), a senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said

"Nothing is more important to American families than the health of their children. It is critical that we continue to improve our understanding of the causes of child leukemia and learn how this heartbreaking disease be prevented, therefore this study deserves critical consideration."

Actor and advocate Alec Baldwin said:

"exposure to ambient levels of radiation near nuclear reactors used by public utilities has long been suspected as a significant contributor to various cancers and other diseases." Baldwin, who has a long-standing interest in radiation health issues, adds "nuclear power is not the clean, efficient energy panacea to which we are presently being reintroduced. It is dirty, poses serious security threats to our country, and is ridiculously expensive. Nukes are still a military technology forced on the American public with a dressed up civilian application."

Study authors were epidemiologist Joseph Mangano MPH MBA, Director of the Radiation and Public Health Project and toxicologist Janette Sherman MD of the Environmental Institute at Western Michigan University. They analyzed leukemia deaths in children age 0-19 in the 67 counties near 51 nuclear power plants starting 1957-1981 (the same counties in the NCI study). About 25 million people live in these 67 counties, and the 51 plants represent nearly half of the U.S. total).

Using mortality statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Mangano and Sherman found that in 1985-2004, the change in local child leukemia mortality (vs. the U.S.) compared to the earliest years of reactor operations were:

* An increase of 13.9% near nuclear plants started 1957-1970 (oldest plants)

* An increase of 9.4% near nuclear plants started 1971-1981 (newer plants)

* A decrease of 5.5% near nuclear plants started 1957-1981 and later shut down

The 13.9% rise near the older plants suggests a potential effect of greater radioactive contamination near aging reactors, while the 5.5% decline near closed reactors suggests a link between less contamination and lower leukemia rates. The large number of child leukemia deaths in the study (1292) makes many of the results statistically significant.

The Mangano/Sherman report follows a 2007 meta-analysis also published in the European Journal of Cancer Care by researchers from the Medical University of South Carolina. That report reviewed 17 medical journal articles on child leukemia rates near reactors, and found that all 17 detected elevated rates. A January 2008 European Journal of Cancer article that found high rates of child leukemia near German reactors from 1980-2003 is believed to be the largest study on the topic (1592 leukemia cases).

The carcinogenic effects of radiation exposure are most severe among infants and children. Leukemia is the type of childhood cancer most closely associated with exposures to toxic agents such as radiation, and has been most frequently studied by scientists. In the U.S., childhood leukemia incidence has risen 28.7% from 1975-2004 according to CDC data, suggesting that more detailed studies on causes are warranted.

The Radiation and Public Health Project is a non profit group of health professionals and scientists based in New York that studies health risks from radioactive exposures to nuclear reactors and weapons tests. RPHP members have published 23 medical journal articles on the topic. A copy of the child leukemia article is availale online by clicking here.

Source: Atheo News

======================================

Leukemia: Children who live near a nuclear plant are at far greater risk

http://www.healthy.net/scr/news.asp?Id=9310

Published on Saturday, August 04, 2007 by Healthy News Service

Children and young people who live near a nuclear plant are far more likely to develop leukemia, a major study has discovered.

Death rates increased by up to 24 per cent in children aged nine or younger, depending on how close the children lived to a plant. In young people up to the age of 25, the death rate rose as high as 18 per cent in some areas.

Overall incidence rates of leukemia increased by 21 per cent in children aged up to nine years, and by 10 per cent in young people aged up to 25 years.

The study is one of the first to take a global view of the problem. The researchers looked at 17 study papers that covered 136 nuclear sites in the UK, Canada, France, the USA, Germany, Japan and Spain.

As nuclear plants are usually sited in rural areas, the population size has often been too small for a meaningful scientific study. The research team, from the Medical University of South Carolina, were able to measure the health of the local populations before and after a nuclear plant was installed.

(Source: European Journal of Cancer Care, 2007; 16: 355-63)

Provided by What Doctors Don't Tell You on 8/4/2007
http://www.healthy.net/scr/Bio.asp?Id=101

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