Nuclear Reactor Decline Means Less Disease

The Legacy of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, counterpunch by JOSEPH J. MANGANO and JANETTE D. SHERMAN, MD, 5 Aug 13, “……… Health and safety concerns have plagued nuclear plants for decades. In the 1970s, orders for new reactors stopped as Wall Street investors halted loans for what they saw as poor investments with costly technical problems. However. in the past decade, industry executives promoted nuclear power as an alternative to greenhouse gas emitters (which is a falsehood, since huge amounts of fossil fuel carbon emitters are required to prepare uranium for use), but no new plants were built. The number of U.S. reactors held steady at 104 since 1998 – until earlier this year, when four reactors shut permanently. More closings are expected. Utility companies, facing plunging stock prices and profits, are now laying off workers to cut costs.

Executives claim that reactors are closing because of high costs, higher than other sources such as natural gas and wind power. The full explanation is that costs of these aging, corroding, and leaking units are high because of radiation dangers. Reactors require:

1. Complicated and expensive parts – to ensure dangerous radiation is contained and workers are not exposed

2. Many highly-trained staff – to ensure dangerous radiation is contained, including armed guards.

3. Complex security measures – to keep dangerous radiationaway from the general public and of course, terrorists

4. Replacement of aging, costly parts – to ensure dangerous radiation is contained.

The poor outlook for nuclear power is worldwide. Since the Fukushima disaster over two years ago, only two (2) of 54 reactors in Japan are operating; the others remain closed while safety upgrades are made. In the past few years, 8 of 17 German reactors closed, and the remainder will be shut by 2022. Switzerland has committed to closing its reactors, and Italy scrapped plans to build new ones.

From a health standpoint, reactor shut downs represent preventive health in its purest form, as known poisons are removed from the environment. Journal articles have shown that just two years after reactors closed, local rates of infant deaths and child cancers plunged. A recent study near the Rancho Seco reactor (closed 1989) in Sacramento County, California estimated there were 4,300 fewer cancer cases among county residents in the 20 years after shut down. These findings are similar to what happened nationwide after atmospheric nuclear weapons tests were banned.

The threats to health posed by fallout from bomb tests half a century ago are the same threats from the same radioactive fallout from nuclear reactors today. Bomb tests were banned, health improved, and few would consider resuming such tests. With 116 million Americans living within 50 miles of a nuclear reactor, history can repeat itself. Like the Test Ban Treaty, closing reactors can prove to be an act to improve health in America and worldwide.

Joseph J. Mangano MPH MBA is Executive Director of the Radiation and Public Health Project.

Janette D. Sherman MD is an internist and toxicologist, and editor of Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/05/the-legacy-of-the-comprehensive-test-ban-treaty/