Very high doses of radiation: death within hours or days, due to damage to brain and nerves

High doses: death within weeks, due to damage to the gastrointestinal tract, to the bone marrow, where blood cells are formed.

Lower doses: less severe:radiation sickness (nausea, fatigue and vomiting). Sterility. Some years later - cancer, (especially of thyroid), diseases of digestive organs, bone, & muscle.

Genetic effects: cell damage passed on to later generations

US Nuclear Regulatory Commission Fact Sheet on Biological Effects of Radiation - Cancers associated with high dose exposure (greater than 50,000 mrem) include leukemia, breast, bladder, colon, liver, lung, esophagus, ovarian, multiple myeloma, and stomach cancers. Department of Health and Human Services literature also suggests a possible association between ionizing radiation exposure and prostate, nasal cavity/sinuses, pharyngeal and laryngeal, and pancreatic cancer.

The period of time between radiation exposure and the detection of cancer is known as the latent period and can be many years........the radiation protection community conservatively assumes that any amount of radiation may pose some risk for causing cancer and hereditary effect, and that the risk is higher for higher radiation exposures.A linear, no-threshold (LNT) dose response relationship is used to describe the relationship between radiation dose and the occurrence of cancer.

This dose-response model suggests that any increase in dose, no matter how small, results in an incremental increase in risk. ...High radiation doses tend to kill cells, while low doses tend to damage or alter the genetic code (DNA) of irradiated cells...............Genetic effects and the development of cancer are the primary health concerns attributed to radiation exposure. The likelihood of cancer occurring after radiation exposure is about five times greater than a genetic effect (e.g., increased still births, congenital abnormalities, infant mortality, childhood mortality, and decreased birth weight)

Genetic effects are the result of a mutation produced in the reproductive cells of an exposed individual that are passed on to their offspring. These effects may appear in the exposed person's direct offspring, or may appear several generations later.

We all know something about the harm done to humans and animals by nuclear bombs, depleted uranium weapons, nuclear explosions and other accidents - such as large radiation leaks and spillages. We know that high levels of radiation cause quick death, or fatal illness within weeks.

What is not so obvious is the harm being done to human (and animal) health by "low level" ionising radiation from every stage of the uranium - nuclear cycle.

Low level radioactivity

includes the on-going amount of radiation released from the everyday operation of the uranium industry and of the world's 433 nuclear power plants, plus leaks and accidents.

Low level radiation causes mutations in genes leading to various cancers. It weakens the immune system, making the body more vulnerable to heart disease and to infections.Genetic effects: cell damage passed on to later generations.

"The everyday releases of low-level radioactivity by nuclear power plants has been found to cause several kinds of health damage including premature births, congenital defects, infant mortality, mental retardation, heart ailments, arthritis, diabetes, allergies, asthma, cancer, genetic damage and chronic fatigue syndrome. It has been linked to previously unknown infectious diseases, and the resurgence of old ones by damaging the developing white blood cells originating in the bone marrow and thus weakening the immune system" -Sara Shannon,author of Technology's Curse

Mikhail Gorbachev: 'My family paid too high a price for glasnost' Telegraph.co.uk 07/05/2008 ……………………Almost 10 years have passed since the death of his wife Raisa, and he misses her bitterly………………..what her husband remembers most. Her foundation works for children who contracted leukaemia after the Chernobyl radiation disaster, and he still recalls her devastation at their plight.

"In a small Russian hospital, she met young mothers with their babies. These women were on their knees, weeping and pleading for help." Soon afterwards, Raisa herself was diagnosed with a rare form of leukaemia............(Gorbachev) ……………….has two great regrets. The first is that nuclear non-proliferation, for which he won a Nobel Peace Prize, has stalled. "Political leaders still think things can be done through force, but that cannot solve terrorism. Backwardness is the breeding ground of terror, and that is what we have to fight."

Daughter files suit to help father who lived in Los Alamos The Associated Press Las Cruces Sun News 4 May 08 LOS ALAMOS, N.M. - "-A woman whose father played in oddly colored streams here as a child and died at age 63 of a cancer associated with plutonium has filed a lawsuit against the University of California, the former manager of Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Rene Ryman's lawyer, Michael Howell, filed a lawsuit for her in U.S. District Court in Albuquerque last week against UC and other managers of the nuclear weapons lab in the '40s and '50s, charging negligence and wrongful death.

Howell said the lawsuit could turn into a class action suit.
'If enough people come forward, there's a chance we could do a medical-monitoring class action,' Howell said.
If successful, that type of lawsuit would pay for the testing of all people who grew up in the area at that time, he said...........................Looking through a list of her classmates at Los Alamos High School, Loss said she thinks there are a lot more out there who suffered from the contamination as she ticks off the large number of old friends who have died of cancer.
'Breast cancer, brain cancer, breast cancer, lung cancer, lymphoma, brain cancer .......'she said................................".

More says committee fighting 'global battle'
Northumberland Today By Parker, Shelby 1 May 08
"One day before Mayor Linda Thompson asked residents to end the uranium dangers debate, the Port Hope Community Health Concerns Committee was speaking in Ottawa about why they will never be silenced.
'It's not a Port Hope battle, it's a global battle,' said Faye More, chairperson of the health concerns committee.

The committee was invited by the Physicians for Global Survival to the April 21 press conference in Ottawa, to speak on issues in Port Hope. ...........................................The health concerns committee has maintained there are health risks from uranium in the environment in Port Hope............................................."

Afghan 'health link' to uranium BBC News By Dawood Azami 30 April 08 - "Doctors in Afghanistan say rates of some health problems affecting children have doubled in the last two years.

Some scientists say the rise is linked to use of weapons containing depleted uranium (DU) by the US-led coalition that invaded the country in 2001.
A Canadian research group found very high levels of uranium in Afghans during tests just after the invasion.

claims made in the BBC World Service One Planet programme suggest the invasion may have left an unwelcome legacy for the country's environment and the health of its people.

Doctors in Kabul and Kandahar showed data indicating that the incidence of a number of health conditions, including birth defects, has doubled in under two years.

'We have premature births and malformations,'said one doctor, who wished to remain anonymous, in one of the main maternity and neo-natal hospitals in the country............".

Chernobyl Remembered: Beyond Nuclear 26 April 08 As we remember - on April 26th - the world's worst nuclear accident, it's important also to recognize that the victims of that accident are still being born today and that quantifying those who died, will die, or who will live forever maimed by the accident is virtually impossible.

Sadly, exposure to radiation can be passed down - genetically - to children born after the accident. Many now languish in poorly-resourced orphanages.

Some of the faces of Chernobyl have been captured by the award-winning photographer, Gabriela Bulisova. You can view a selection of her pictures on our Web site at: beyondnuclear as we remember just what kind of catastrophic damage nuclear power can effect.

Hospitals' disposal of radioactive waste not safe Daily Times Pakistan, By Abdul Manan April 18, 2008 - "…………………An official of the Environment Protection Department (EPD) said that countless hospitals, out of convenience, disposed of their liquid waste into open drains without treatment. He said that some hospitals with the radiotherapy facilities threw their radioactive waste into general waste disposal system.

He said that the EPD neither warned nor restricted the hospitals regarding their contribution to radioactive pollution…

………….An official from the PAEC confirmed that the hospitals...................dumped it into their general waste disposal system, adding that hospitals thus avoided the expenditure on lead packing. He said that radioactive waste continuously emitted radiation, which was hazardous to human health...

.......Dr Shamsuddin, a radiologist at a private hospital, said that all ionising radiation, including that of cobalt 60, was known to cause cancer. He said that frequent exposure to gamma radiation from cobalt 60 increased the risk of cancer. ……………………….radioactive waste containing metals, when incinerated, emitted radioactive pollution into the atmosphere.

He said that radiation, once released into the environment, could remain in the atmosphere for decades or centuries, increasing the likelihood of human exposure.

GOVERNMENT DOES NOT CARE
Radioactive Waste Killing Russians Javno 11 April 09
- "These problems have been present throughout Russia since the 50s and nobody isn`t doing anything - president of the Green Cross said.Russian town Chapaevsk, situated in Samara region has been dying for several decades due to radiation consequences, causing many deaths. Tuberculosis, throat and liver cancer have decimated the town`s population, Russian Pravda writes.

Radiation was caused by the Russian government which has been allowing radioactive material disposal in the town`s vicinity ever since World War II. After radiation has destroyed all nature surrounding Chapaevsk, it caught up with the plantations and town water supply at the beginning of the 1990s.

With the arrival of radioactive waste to households, numerous diseases came, causing the locals to fall ill with various serious illnesses alarming the local authorities.

Apart from purifying underground waters and relocating the residents, there is no other solution. The extent to which these solutions are inapplicable is evident from the fact that both would amount to 100 million dollars. Thus, Chapaevsk locals wonder is Russia letting them die off, making the entire town one big radioactive waste dump. ........................................The president of the Greens stressed that great problems with radiation consequences have made the residents move away from several Russian towns.
Leonidocka, Krasny Bor and Sursky are completely empty because dangerous materials were dumped near them, Baranovsky said, adding it was high time Russian authorities solved these matters.......................................................".

The Washington Post By ROB STEIN - '7 April 08 - "The number of people undergoing CT scans has surged in recent years, driving a significant increase in the amount of radiation that many people are being exposed to.
That trend is raising concern that the high-tech exams are being overused, exposing millions of Americans to needless risk.
"The radiation doses from CT have been pretty clearly

demonstrated to increase cancer risk," said David Brenner, a professor of radiation oncology at Columbia University who co-authored the most recent of a series of reports warning about the potential risks of CT scans...................…………………The number of scans performed each year in the U.S. has risen from about 3 million in 1980 to at least 67 million in 2006.

'CT has become ubiquitous,' said Jason Launders, a senior project officer at the ECRI Institute, an independent nonprofit healthcare research organization that released a report last year about the potential risks. "Now, if you go into an emergency room you can be scanned in a few minutes. You can't get that kind of information any other way. So physicians tend to use CT as sort of a first line in working out a diagnosis.'

………………….researchers have estimated the risk based on what is considered the best information available -- data collected from survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as exposure of nuclear plant and medical workers. …………………"Twenty years from now we could see a huge bonus of cancer coming through because of indiscriminate use of CT today," Launders said. "That's the real issue people are worried about."

………………………..Younger people face more risk than older people because they have more time for a cancer to develop. Children are especially vulnerable, because their rapidly developing bodies are at least four times as sensitive to the damaging effects of radiation.

A child's risk may run as high as one case of cancer for every 500 scans.

Among adults, '"young women have the highest risk' said Andrew Einstein of Columbia University, who evaluated the risks from cardiac CT scans in a paper published in July in the Journal of the American Medical Association. A 20-year-old woman faced the greatest risk -- one additional cancer for every 143 scans, he said ".

Federal neglect of atomic vets 'disgraceful'
David Pugliese, The Ottawa Citizen
April 05, 2008
"The Conservative government is stalling in providing compensation to sick veterans who were exposed to radiation during Cold War atomic tests, says one of the men who was promised financial help more than a year ago.
Robert Henderson, who was part of a radiation monitoring team during five nuclear blasts, said the veterans are dying off as they wait in vain for compensation promised to them by the Harper government………………

………..The veterans have been battling for compensation and recognition for the last five decades through both Conservative and Liberal governments. Their case was bolstered in 2007 when a Defence Department report determined that an estimated 900 Canadian military personnel were exposed to radiation during atomic tests and during a reactor mishap at Chalk River during the 1950s.........................................................".

Villagers dig their own grave Sydney Morning Herald April 5, 2008 - "In Hunan province, peasants have made a cottage industry out of mining uranium ore. John Garnaut and Maya Li report. ………………This black-market uranium - probably uraninite, containing up to a third of uranium oxide - has been retrieved from one of 18 abandoned mine shafts in the mountains that tower above the village. .........................……

…………local residents, especially mine workers, have higher cancer rates and die much younger than the national average, the local Great Country Hospital, run by the 712 mining company, reports. Lung cancer, silicosis, leukemia, liver cancer and congenital birth defects are particularly common, they say.

"In 2003 our survey showed 8 per cent of the population, or 350 out of 4000 people, had cancer - when the national average was between 1 and 2 per cent," a health professional at the hospital says. ……

……….hundreds of former uranium industry workers are banding together in hope of government compensation. A large number of state-employed uranium prospectors now living in Guilin, in neighbouring Guangxi province, are cautiously preparing to petition Beijing.

But workers elsewhere in Hunan are not as patient. In a simple cottage near Chenzhou, 150 kilometres to the south of 712, former mine workers are working themselves into a passionate exposition of their plight. They toiled at 711, which is written into Chinese history as the primary uranium source for China's first nuclear weapon………………

………….The men show us a lengthy petition that details their endeavours, their ailments, the company's pitiful compensation payments and its refusal to hand over their health records. The document is signed by 61 workers and is intended for Beijing.

………………….The group has travelled to Beijing three times to present its case to the national petitions' office, their only legal avenue of redress. And three times undercover security officials from Chenzhou have been waiting there to intercept, detain and escort them home again. Theirs is not a story that the Chenzhou city government wants Beijing or the wider world to hear. ……………

…………….Zhou Xinghuo, a nuclear expert at Hunan University, says there are now no problems with China's nuclear industry. His views seem to have changed since 2006, when he told Phoenix Weekly that the dam water at 712, which is now ringed by canola, contains dangerously high traces of uranium.

Mr Zhou added that an official at China National Nuclear Corporation had recently called from Beijing to warn that he shouldn't talk so much........................................".

Aishah Ali's interview with geoscientist Leuren Moret Tehran Times March 18, 2008 (Source: Madame Chair Magazine) "…………….The February War Crimes Conference in Kuala Lumpur is the most recent of the annual events organized by the Perdana Global Peace Forum. …..Among the eloquent speakers was geoscientist and international radiation specialist Leuren Moret, who gave a startling revelation about the effects of radiation and how our global environment has been contaminated from atomic bomb testing since 1945 to the present ……………

…………Leuren Moret: 'When a nuclear bomb explodes or when a DU weapon burns, it produces radioactive poison gas. Uranium when it burns is hotter than the sun and it forms extremely tiny particles. These particles stay in the air until rain or snow removes them and they contaminate our soil and water. Areas where there is high rainfall such as Hawaii, or the coastal areas in Southeast Asia, have much higher levels of radiation rained out into the local environment. Of course, this damages all living things, not just humans. ………

……….the radioactive effect where nuclear particles disturb the cells. Our cells communicate with one another but what happens is the radiation damages the signals and cells start to malfunction. The third and most serious effect of DU is the nanoparticle or "particulate" effect. Because the suspended DU particles which travel around the world are so tiny, they disturb the signaling and information flow in the cell processes and functions of the body. ……………

…………….DU is radioactive trash from the atomic weapons project and the nuclear power industry. It is a radioactive metal and occurs in three isotopes (forms of a chemical element differing in their atomic weight) -- Uranium 238, Uranium 235 and Uranium 234.

They all behave the same chemically because they have the same number of electrons in the outer shell, but they are slightly different in mass.

The isotope that scientists want is Uranium 235 because it will explode in nuclear bombs like the Hiroshima bomb. Today they mine the uranium and take 0.5 per cent out of U235 from the ore to make into nuclear reactor fuel.

The rest is trash. It's called depleted uranium or DU because they have removed the half percent of U235.It's a bomb tester's term. It does not mean it is depleted in radiation. It is depleted in U235 because the vital half a per cent has been extracted. …………………………..This is in huge junk piles stored in drums in solid metal at the Department of Energy sites in the U.S. The U.S. is using thousands of tons of DU in dirty bombs, dirty missiles and dirty bullets all over the Middle East and Central Asia. We're importing it from Canada, Belgium and South Africa.

Fortunately the Belgian Parliament has just passed a law abolishing all DU weapons manufacturing, testing, storage and sales. It is the first country in the world to do this.

This is extremely significant because Belgium was exporting DU weapons to the U.S.; it is the headquarters of NATO and the seat of the European Parliament. ....................................'................................................................."

Fallout From Atomic Bombs Still Causing Health Problems Washington Post By Alan Mozes March 14, 2008 --" Among Japanese survivors of the atomic bombs dropped by the U.S. on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, those exposed to radioactive fallout as young children appear to face a greater risk of developing adult cancers than those exposed while still in the womb, new research suggests.

To date, the risk posed by radiation exposure while in the womb has been a little-studied subject, even though many pregnant women worldwide face radiation exposure through their work or as patients. ................

.............Initially called the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission, the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF)'s mission is to examine the long-term impact of radiation exposure among Japan's 120,000-plus survivors of the bombings.........

............the new study focused on survivors who were between the ages of 12 and 55 between 1958 and 1999. Nearly 2,500 of the male and female participants were in utero when the bombs fell, while nearly 15,500 were below the age of 6 at the time...................................................Preston and his team found that 336 men and 407 women had developed cancer during the study period, with diagnosis rates increasing dramatically after the age of 40. Cancers of the digestive system were most common, accounting for 70 percent of male and 30 percent of female malignancies. Tumors of the breast and reproductive system accounted for 48 percent of malignancies in women.

..........................................Preston and his colleagues concluded that early childhood atomic bomb exposure was linked to a greater risk for adult cancers than exposure in the womb. . ...."

Reassessing medical imaging INDYSTAR.COM March 9, 2008 - "Rising rate of procedures is costly and can take heavy toll on patient health, physicians say By Daniel Lee A growing number of people are getting CT and PET scans, multi-dimensional images that can help physicians diagnose and treat numerous conditions.

But concerns are growing about their use. Are too many being given and are there long-term effects from radiation overexposure? .................................The use of medical imaging services in Indiana has been rising at a rate of about 20 percent a year, according to WellPoint's Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield. That far outpaces the roughly 5 percent to 10 percent annual growth for all medical services in the state.............

................According to AIM, the amount of radiation exposure can be high: An abdominal CT scan, for example, is equal to 500 chest X-rays or 2.74 years of natural sunlight.A new study in the journal Annals of Emergency Medicine found that the median radiation from scans that trauma patients received in an emergency department was equal to 1,005 chest X-rays.

'There are times where clearly there are certain imaging tests for certain situations,' said Dr. Valerie Jackson, the John A. Campbell Professor of radiology at Indiana University School of Medicine. 'Or there are times where tests are inappropriate.................'But you have to wonder when somebody's getting multiple tests when it could be evaluated with one test.' Physicians also are facing more questions about what is best for the patient's long-term health.

'There's no question about it, there is a dilemma that we're exposing people to a lot of radiation,' said Dr. Bernie Emkes, medical director of managed care services for Indianapolis-based hospital system St. Vincent Health...............................".

Study links radiation to heart disease Mar 4, 2008 By Michael Kahn LONDON (Reuters) - "Nuclear power plant workers exposed to chronic radiation may face a higher risk of heart disease, according to a large study published on Tuesday.Other research has shown that high exposure over a short period of time may cause heart disease but the new findings link exposure to long-term exposure at relatively lower levels, the researchers said in the International Journal of Epidemiology.

'Our results provide more evidence of a link,' said Steve Jones, a researcher at Westlakes Scientific Consulting, who led the study. 'This adds to the evidence of similar associations from other studies…………'…

……..The study focused on more than 65,000 workers employed between 1946 and 2002 at four sites operated by British Nuclear Fuels plc and its predecessors. The team analyzed non-cancer death rates and cumulative radiation exposure using the workers' personal dosimeter badges.
Comparing the some 42,000 workers exposed to relatively high levels of radiation to office workers and other employees pointed to an increased heart disease risk, the researchers said.

Uranium mine waste imperils villages in Jaduguda Down to Earth APARNA PALLAVI 7 March 08 - "Radioactive waste from three government-owned uranium mines has put about 50,000 people in Jharkhand's Jaduguda at risk. The people, mostly tribal communities, suffer from serious radiation-related health problems. But the mines in East Singhbhum district continue without adequate safety measures.

On studying more than 9,000 people (over 2,000 houses) in five villages near the mines owned by the Uranium Corporation of India Limited (ucil), researchers found cases of congenital deformities, sterility, spontaneous abortions and cancer were alarmingly high among the villagers, mostly from the Ho, Santhal, Munda and Mahali tribes. he mines, set up four decades ago, employ around 5,000 people. A team from the Indian Doctors for Peace and Development (idpd) and a local ngo Jharkhandi Organisation Against Radiation (joar) conducted the study in May-August last year............................................".

Too Much of a Good Thing? The Growing Use of CT Scans Fuels Medical Concerns About Radiation Exposure - "Washington Post Rob Stein January 15, 2008
- "The number of Americans undergoing CT scans has increased dramatically in recent years, driving a significant increase in the amount of radiation that many people are being exposed to from medical procedures.
......................."The radiation doses from CT have been pretty clearly demonstrated to increase cancer risk," said David J. Brenner, a professor of radiation oncology at Columbia University who co-authored the most recent of a series of reports in the past year warning about the potential risks of CT scans.

The concern comes from the fact that CT scans expose patients to much more radiation than standard X-rays. A CT chest scan, for example, exposes a patient to more than 150 times more radiation than a standard chest X-ray. That's more than twice as much as a typical person receives from the environment in an entire year.

The upsurge in CT use has fueled a big jump in the annual amount of radiation that each American is receiving from medical procedures of all kinds. The average level of that exposure has increased about 600-fold since 1980, according to a federal report being published this year.

The upsurge in CT use has fueled a big jump in the annual amount of radiation that each American is receiving from medical procedures of all kinds. The average level of that exposure has increased about 600-fold since 1980, according to a federal report being published this year.

"Twenty years from now we could see a huge bonus of cancer coming through because of indiscriminate use of CT today," Launders said. "That's the real issue people are worried about."

The individual risk varies depending on the age of the patient and the type of scan. Younger people face more risk than older people because they have more time for a cancer to develop. Children are especially vulnerable because their rapidly developing bodies are at least four times as sensitive to the damaging effects of radiation........................Among adults, 'young women have the highest risk'...............,"

Dying crew of atomic test ship battle MoD for compensation Guardian Unlimited Mark Townsend
Sunday January 6, 2008
The Observer - "The surviving crew of a British warship ordered into the radioactive fallout of a nuclear bomb test have told of the agonies and traumas they have suffered in a series of remarkable new testimonies that form part of their case to win government compensation.

The destroyer HMS Diana was sent by defence officials into the zone of an atomic test in the South Pacific in 1956 to discover the effects of a nuclear explosion on naval vessels and their men. Of the 308-strong crew, around two-thirds have died, with survivors claiming that a range of illnesses including cancer, cataracts and lung disorders may have been caused by 'ingesting radiationi.........

........The atomic experiments on the deserted Monte Bello islands, 200 miles north of Australia, involved the vessel being ordered to enter the blast zone to 'pick up as much contamination as possible'. Yet even before the tests, internal papers provided by the government's atomic weapons agency reveal that officials were attempting to distance themselves from themission if adverse health effects were later diagnosed.........................................".

Child cancer risk higher near nuclear plants: study BERLIN (Reuters) Dec 8, 2007 -

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).

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..............................

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

Muslim Peacemaker Teams: Depleted Uranium Crisis in Najaf
Monitoring Net of Human Rights in Iraq - MHRI
Uruknet infoJanuary 8, 2008 This was not an exhaustive study because of the limits of personnel, resources and equipment. But it did rely on accumulated public data, thorough research, and a major contribution of time and energy. The focus was Najaf, a city of over one million people, and the rural areas in the governate. The area is about 180 miles from where DU was used in the First Gulf War.

Starting in 2004 when the political situation and devastation of the health care infrastructure were at their worst, there were 251 reported cases of cancer. By 2006, when the numbers more accurately reflected the real situation, that figure had risen to 688. Already in 2007, 801 cancer cases have been reported. Those figures portray an incidence rate of 28.21 by 2006, even after screening out cases that came into the Najaf Hospital from outside the governate, a number which contrasts with the normal rate of 8-12 cases of cancer per 100,000 people. Sami Rasouli, Dr. Najim Askouri and Dr. Assad Al-Janabi, members of Muslim Peacemaker Teams (MPT) in Najaf, visited with Christian Peacemaker Teams CPT) in Suleimaniya, Kurdish Iraq, on December 10 and 11. The visit was an opportunity to report the recent activities of the respective peacemaker groups and learn to know new people. But the primary activity was a forum on depleted uranium (DU) presented by Drs. Assad and Najim.

Dr. Assad is the director of the Pathology Department at the 400-bed public hospital in Najaf. Dr. Najim is a nuclear physicist, trained in Britain, and one of the leading nuclear researchers in Iraq until his departure in 1998. They have worked as an MPT team documenting information about the health impact on Najaf of depleted uranium weapons used during the 1991 and 2003 Gulf wars. …..Two observations are striking. One, there has been a dramatic increase in the cancers that are related to radiation exposure, especially the very rare soft tissue sarcoma and leukemia. Two, the age at which cancer begins in an individual has been dropping rapidly, with incidents of breast cancer at 16, colon cancer at 8, and liposarcoma at 1.5 years. Dr. Assad noted that 6% of the cancers reported occurred in the 11-20 age range and another 18% in ages 21-30. ……………………………..Dr. Najim began his report by noting that Coalition Forces, mostly U.S., used 350 tons of DU weapons in about 45 days in 1991, primarily in the stretch of Iraq northwest of Kuwait where Iraqi troops were on their retreat. Then in 2003, during the Shock and Awe bombing of Baghdad, the U.S. used another 150 tons of DU.

When DU hits a target it aerosolizes and oxidizes forming a uranium oxide that is two parts UO3 and one part UO2. The first is water soluble and filters down into the water aquifers and also becomes part of the food chain as plants take up the UO3 dissolved in water. The UO2 is insoluble and settles as dust on the surface of the earth and is blown by the winds to other locations..................................".

Malignancies Cancer research: misspent money, wasted efforts and unconscionable profits ZNet Globe and Mail by Andrew Nikiforuk 20 Nov 07 Review of The secret history of the war on cancer By Devra Davis, basic Books "………………..the cancer establishment has retreated from the truth faster than Canada's commitment to a greener country. What began as sincere investigation into the economic root causes of a complex set of 200 different diseases, at the turn of the 20th century, quickly degenerated into a single-minded focus on treatments after the Second World War, argues Devra Davis, one of North America's sharpest epidemiologists..........................

In the process, industry and its propaganda hit men have used every opportunity to discredit, dismiss or disparage information on cancer hazards in the workplace or at home...........

Consider the invasion of computerized imaging technology (CT scans) in modern medicine. Since its invention in the 1970s, CT scanning has become a $100-billion industry that creates nifty three-dimensional images, yet exposes patients to radiation.

CT scans have become such a favoured technology that one in every three scans recommended for children is probably unnecessary

In the last 25 years, the amount of radiation zapping North Americans from scanning and the like has increased fivefold. ..........

'Modern America's annual exposure to radiation from diagnostic machines is equal to that released by a nuclear accident that spewed the equivalent of hundreds of Hiroshimas across much of Russia and Eastern Europe.'

Most physicians don't know that a typical CT scan equals 400 chest X-rays. A group of researchers at Yale now estimate that radiation from CT scans of the head and abdomen will kill 2,500 people a year.................".

.

Asia: Russian villagers living the horror of a nuclear explosion 50 years ago THE ASAHI SHIMBUN BY MASAMI ONO, Tetsu Kobayashi in Tokyo also contributed to this article i: December 20,2007) CHELYABINSK, Russia- "An explosion at the Mayak nuclear plant here that devastated the southern Ural region a half-century ago still casts a shadow over Russians living in the area. The 1957 blast is regarded as having caused the worst contamination in the former Soviet Union until the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
The facility also dumped radioactive waste into a river or lakes nearby for many years.

At present, the Russian government is taking measures to strengthen the nuclear industry. However, the history of the Mayak facility shows that those measures can pose dangers.

On Sept. 29, 1957, a cooling system for a tank that stored liquid radioactive waste exploded at the Mayak nuclear plant. The facility had manufactured the Soviet Union's first plutonium for atomic bombs.

The blast scattered radioactive matter over 20,000 square kilometers. In total, 270,000 residents of 217 villages were affected, according to a report compiled by environmental protection group Greenpeace Russia, based on the government's data and other materials. The worst affected were some 10,000 residents of 23 villages. Their areas were so badly contaminated that they were secretly forced to be relocated to other areas.....................................................

'Safe' uranium that left a town contaminated They were told depleted uranium was not hazardous. Now, 23 years after a US arms plant closed, workers and residents have cancer - and experts say their suffering shows the use of such weapons may be a war crimeDavid Rose in Colonie, New York
Guardian Umlimited November 18, 2007
"……………………………………………The US federal government and the firm that ran the factory, National Lead (NL) Industries, have been assuring former workers and residents around the 18-acre site for decades that, although it is true that the plant used to produce unacceptable levels of radioactive pollution, it was not a serious health hazard.

Now, in a development with potentially devastating implications not only for Colonie but also for the future use of some of the West's most powerful weapon systems, that claim is being challenged. In a paper to be published in the next issue of the scientific journal Science of the Total Environment, a team led by Professor Randall Parrish of Leicester University reports the results of a three-year study of Colonie, funded by Britain's Ministry of Defence.

Parrish's team has found that DU contamination, which remains radioactive for millions of years, is in effect impossible to eradicate, not only from the environment but also from the bodies of humans. Twenty-three years after production ceased they tested the urine of five former workers. All are still contaminated with DU. So were 20 per cent of people tested who had spent at least 10 years living near the factory when it was still working, including Ciarfello.

The small sample size precludes the drawing of statistical conclusions, the journal paper says. But to find DU at all after so long a period is 'significant, since no previous study has documented evidence of DU exposure more than 20 years prior... [this] indicates that the body burden of uranium must still be significant, whether retained in lungs, lymphatic system, kidneys or bone'. The team is now testing more individuals…………

……………………..Inside the body DU travels around the bloodstream, accumulating not only in the lungs but also in other soft tissues such as the brain and bone marrow. There, each mote becomes an alpha particle hotspot, bombarding its locality and damaging cell DNA. Research has shown that DU has the potential to cause a wide range of cancers, kidney and thyroid problems, birth defects and disorders of the immune system..................................."

Inside the nuclear underworld: Deformity and fear
CNN.com 12 Sept 07 By Matthew Chance

CNN Editor's note: In our Behind the Scenes series, CNN correspondents share their experiences in covering news and analyze the stories behind the events. CNN's Matthew Chance was given rare access to Kazakh villages where above-ground nuclear tests have left generations scarred. Here, he describes what he saw for CNN.com.

"SEMEY, Kazakhstan (CNN) -- Kazakhstan's nuclear orphans are a distressing sight. The first child I met in the local orphanage was lying limply in his crib. His giant, pale head was perched on his tiny shoulders, covered in bed sores, like a grotesquely painted paper-mâché mask. Peering out, a pair of tiny black eyes darted around.
It took me a few seconds to understand what I was seeing. The doctor told me he was 4 years old.

Through the bars in the next crib, I saw another child, twisted with deformities. His fragile legs and arms turned in impossible contortions.
These are the children of Kazakhstan's terrifying nuclear past. Decades of Soviet nuclear testing unleashed a plague of birth defects.................................Almost every family in Seriqkaisha's village, 20 miles from the old test site, is affected -- from cancers to impotency to birth defects and other deformities..................

...............The genetic defections and illnesses that afflict so many here are frequently a source of shame. The doctor told me that people hide their deformed family members from outsiders. For decades, they have felt like animals in a zoo, she said, and had grown to distrust prying eyes.
The region also has one of the highest suicide rates in the world, according to local health officials. Tragically, many young men who discover they are impotent -- one of the effects of nuclear fallout -- end their own lives......................

.......................The problem of defects is so big, there's even a museum of mutations at the regional medical institute back in Semey, the largest city near the old nuclear testing site. It's a small room filled with jars containing deformed fetuses and human organs preserved in formaldehyde.
It's hard to look at them -- babies with bulging eyes and malformed brains, or conjoined twins locked in a contorted embrace.
The head of the institute, Tolebae Rakhipbekov, showed me around and told me how this house was more than just a grim collection of anomalies It was the reality for some parents, and a real fear for everyone who lives here............................".

500 YEAR NUKE CURSE NUKE TEST VICTIMS: THE PROOF Shock new study of more than 1,000 veterans proves soldiers who were forced to watch British A-bomb tests in the 1950s and 1960s will pass on crippling health problems to families for 20 generations

Sunday Mirror UK By Susie Boniface 16/09/2007 - "A major scientific study into the families of soldiers used as guinea pigs in Britain's first nuclear tests shows they will suffer acute health problems for TWENTY generations.
Relatives of up to 22,000 servicemen who witnessed tests in the 1950s have been cursed with massive genetic damage which will be passed on for at least 500 years.

The shocking new study shows how children and grandchildren suffer limb deformities, tumours, heart, eye and hearing problems, epilepsy, autism, brain deformities, twisted spines, missing organs, extra fingers and toes and a range of rare conditions
The survey, of more than 1,000 veterans and their families, has just been completed by radiation expert Dr Chris Busby of the University of Liverpool. The statistics show that compared to the rest of the population children of veterans are:

Ten times more likely to have an inherited genetic deformity
Five times more likely to die as infants
Three times more likely to be stillborn And their grandchildren are:
Eight times more likely to inherit a defect
Twice as likely to get childhood cancer

The findings show that the men who witnessed Britain's first atom-bomb tests have "scrambled DNA" which has been passed to their descendants. The study, the biggest scientific survey ever carried out on the veterans' descendants, provides the most damning evidence yet of the horrific legacy of the tests....

....Now campaigners say this new study is the final proof of the horrific cost to their health.
Hundreds of trial atomic and hydrogen bombs were detonated in the South Pacific, America and Australia between 1952 and 1967 as Britain joined the nuclear arms race.

The veterans in Australia and New Zealand are still fighting our MoD for compensation as their governments say it is our responsibility.

Dr Busby says the effects on the British men were similar to those seen in the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear power station leak in 1986. He says: 'The main finding is that the grandchildren are suffering at almost the same rate as the children of veterans. In normal genetics, with each generation the effects would be less as new DNA is added to the family line. But with radiation exposure, what happens is that a kind of instability is passed down - like an alarming message in a bottle passed from mother to child. It tells the child to scramble its genes randomly in all directions, so you get many children with strange deformities'....''.

U.S. nuke work afflicted 36,500 Americans Rocky Mountain News.com By Ann Imse August 31, 2007
"The U.S. nuclear weapons program has sickened 36,500 Americans and killed more than 4,000, the Rocky Mountain News has determined from government figures.
Those numbers reflect only people who have been approved for government compensation. They include people who mined uranium, built bombs and breathed dust from bomb tests.

Many of the bomb-builders, such as those at the Rocky Flats plant near Denver, have never applied for compensation or were rejected because they could not prove their work caused their illnesses. Congressional hearings are in the works to review allegations of unfairness and delays in the program for weapons workers.

More than 15,000 of the 36,500 are workers who made atomic weapons. They were exposed to radiation and toxic chemicals that typically took years to trigger cancer or lung disease. Others were civilians living near the Nevada test site during above-ground nuclear tests; soldiers and workers at test sites; and uranium miners and millers who breathed in radioactive dust until 1972 when the government stopped buying uranium...........

.................At least 4,000 of the 36,500 died. This number reflects cases where survivors could be paid only if their relative died of the covered illness.
Many more of the 36,500 likely also have died of the deadly diseases triggered by their work. But in most of the compensation programs, the government does not track deaths or cause of death, so the true number who gave their lives to support the nuclear bomb program probably will never be known.
Some were contaminated through accident or ignorance. But government documents have revealed that officials at times risked the health of civilians, soldiers and workers because they believed national security demanded it.
One early Atomic Energy Commission director, Lewis Strauss, wrote to a civilian who had been downwind of atomic test fallout that the danger of fallout was 'a small sacrifice compared to the infinite greater evil of the use of nuclear bombs in war'................"

Chernobyl's grim legacy lingers in Brooklyn By Mattlee Davis - COURIER LIFE 06/02/2007 "It began 21 years ago in the Ukraine and became known as the worst nuclear reactor disaster in history, but the effects of the Chernobyl nuclear accident have traveled world-wide and have made their way to Brooklyn's doorstep 'My specialty is thyroid surgery, and we started seeing people coming in who were from the Chernobyl area with thyroid problems,' said Daniel Branovan, M.D. of the NY Eye and Ear Infirmary in Manhattan.

Branovan said there are between 150 and 200 thousand people in the NY metropolitan area who come from the affected region, and the 'cancer rates are going up and up,' he said.............................The same people who migrated to Brooklyn and other boroughs from Chernobyl have the same risk as those who chose to stay in the Ukraine, according to Branovan."The rates of cancer are going up over there [in the Ukraine] and the same thing must be happening here.

......thyroid cancer - a cancer of the butterfly-shaped thyroid gland under the Adam's apple - is the greatest known consequence of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. In fact, Branovan stated that scientists know from experience - referring to the World War II bombing of Hiroshima - that it takes about 20 years for to thyroid cancer to appear................ . "

New UN Radiation Warning: Skull & Crossbones - medGadget February 21, 2007 "......A skull and crossbones, a running person and radiating ionizing waves, all on a deep red triangle, joined other more common warning symbols today as part of a United Nations effort to reduce needless deaths and serious injuries from accidental exposure to large radioactive sources...........................

.The symbol is the result of a five-year project conducted in 11 countries and was tested with different population groups -- mixed ages, varying educational backgrounds, male and female -- to ensure that its message of 'danger - stay away' was crystal clear and understood by all.........."

Depleted Uranium: Pernicious Killer Keeps on Killing - Global Research, by Dr. Craig Etchison February 20, 2007 - ".....................something insidious happens when DU munitions are used. How to explain the exploding rates of cancer, birth defects, and radiation poisoning among Iraqis in the Basra region? How to explain a Department of Veterans Affairs study of 21,000 veterans of the Gulf War that found rates of birth defects were twice as great for male vets and three times as great for female vets who served in the Gulf War compared to vets who did not? How to explain a Washington Post report in January of 2006 that 518,00 of the 580,000 Gulf War veterans were on disability, over half on permanent disability. How to explain over 13,000 dead Gulf War veterans when only 250 were killed and 7,000 injured in the war itself?....................................................

A major problem with most DU assessment is that many effects of alpha radiation on cell structure, including DNA proteins that release biochemical signals and important cell metabolic enzymes, are ignored by nuclear physicists who use dose estimates based on uranium dust in mines, a completely inappropriate approach for a battlefield aerosol. Many medical professionals believe the protein problem is responsible for various neurodegenerative diseases evidenced by Gulf War veterans.

As Dr. Bertell writes, 'Heavy metal exposure (including uranium) can cause loss of cellular immunity, autoimmune diseases, joint disease such as rheumatoid arthritis, and diseases of the kidneys, circulatory system, and nervous system.... Decline in functional mitochondria is most damaging to the heart, kidney, brain, liver, and skeletal muscle, in that order.' Loss of cellular immunity opens an organism up to viral, bacterial, and mycoplasmal invasions connected to a variety of diseases'.

Equally important, scientists have found that tiny amounts of DU too small to be toxic and only mildly radioactive seem to reinforce each other in terms of causing cancers and risk to offspring. The Armed Forces Radiobiological Research Institute has even admitted that DU can cause cancer............................"