Judge rules nuclear reactors causing thyroid cancers
NYTimes: Doctors want ban on thyroid cancer screenings — “A tsunami of thyroid cancer… Stop the diagnosis… We need to actively discourage early detection” — WSJ:Judge rules nuclear reactors causing thyroid cancers — Study: Fukushima-related tumors can spread very fast, must be closely monitoredhttp://enenews.com/nytimes-doctors-call-banning-thyroid-cancer-screening-tsunami-thyroid-cancer-stop-diagnosis-decrease-screening-need-actively-discourage-early-detection
New York Times, Nov. 5, 2014 (emphasis added): To the shock of many cancer experts, the most common cancer in South Korea… is now thyroid cancer, whose incidence has increased fifteenfold in the past two decades. “A tsunami of thyroid cancer,” as one researcher puts it… Cancer experts agree that the reason for the situation in South Korea and elsewhere is not a real increase in the disease. Instead, it is down to screening… “It’s a warning to us in the U.S. that we need to be very careful in our advocacy of screening,” said Dr. Otis W. Brawley, chief medical officer at the American Cancer Society… some doctors, including Dr. Hyeong Sik Ahn of the College of Medicine at Korea University in Seoul, the first author of the new paper, have called for thyroid cancer screening to be banned… Thyroid experts in the United States are calling for restraint in diagnosing and treating tiny tumors… Dr. R. Michael Tuttle… said the best way… was to “stop the diagnosis… decrease screening”
New York Times Op-ed by H. Gilbert Welch, Nov. 5, 2014: An Epidemic of Thyroid Cancer [in South Korea]?… Nowhere in the world is the rate of any cancer growing faster… Where did all those new thyroid cancers come from? They were always there. As early as 1947 [See:August 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, both ~150 miles from S. Korea] … thyroid cancer was a frequent finding during autopsies. Studies have since shown that over a third of adults have thyroid cancer… Even without a concerted effort to promote screening, thyroid cancer incidence in the United States is up threefold since 1975. To reverse this trend,we need to actively discourage early thyroid cancer detection… having doctors not look too hard for early cancer is in your interest… Too many epidemiologists concern themselves.. with hoping to find small health effects of environmental exposures — orworse, uncertain effects of minor genetic alterations.
Wall St. Journal, Oct 21, 2014: A South Korean court for the first time has ruled in favor of a plaintiff claiming… thyroid cancer was caused by radiation from six nuclear power plants located [5 miles] from her house… “She has lived within 10 km of the plants for over 20 years and has thus been exposed to radiation for a long time. Other than the radiation from the nuclear reactors, there’s no clear reason for her cancer,” the court said… [A] government-commissioned study in 2011… showed women living within 5 km of nuclear plants had 2.5 times higher incidences of thyroid cancer… [In a study of the plaintiff’s county by a] nuclear-power research institute… between July 2010 and December 2013, about 1.4%… were found to have thyroid cancer… in 2011 [women had] 114 cases out of 100,000 [0.11%].
UC San Francisco, Oct. 27, 2014: For the first time, researchers have found that exposure to radioactive iodine is associated with more aggressive forms of thyroid cancer… Lydia Zablotska, MD [said] “Our group has previously shown that exposures to [Chernobyl’s] radioactive iodine significantly increase the risk of thyroid cancer… The new study shows that radiation exposures are also associated with distinct clinical features that are more aggressive”… Zablotska said the findings have implications for those exposed to [Fukushima’s] radioactive iodine fallout... “children or adolescents to the fallout are at highest risk and should probably be screened for thyroid cancer regularly, because these cancers are aggressive, and they can spread really fast… Clinicians should be aware of the aggressiveness of radiation-associated tumors and closely monitor those at high risk.”… radioactive iodine [exposures] are associated with a whole spectrum of thyroid diseases… Thyroid cancer is ordinarily rare among children, with less than one new case per million diagnosed each year… [In the study] researchers diagnosed 158 thyroid cancers among 11,664 [13,546 per million] subjects…
Humanity must choose between denuclearization or dispossession.
Fukushima: Dispossession or Denuclearization? by Majia Nadesen http://stop-u238.blogspot.com.au/2014/11/multigenerational-effects-of-exposure.html
We pose the question starkly: Humanity must choose between denuclearization or dispossession.
We document that nuclear power and weapons are connected and their complex fundamentally dispossesses citizens of liberal guarantees, including rights to property, free speech, and the pursuit of happiness.
We explore crisis management of the Fukushima disaster to demonstrate dispossession of rights of property, free speech, and the pursuit of happiness, through examples that include lost livelihoods and Fukushima children’s rising rates of thyroid cancer, among other topics: See Oiwa, Yuri (2014, August 24), Thyroid cancer diagnosed in 104 young people in Fukushima. The Asahi Shimbun,
We examine the history of radiation health effects to demonstrate historical conflicts between nuclear industry safety-guidelines and scientific studies of the biological effects of “internal emitters,” which are ingested and/or inhaled radionuclides.
We describe distortions in nuclear industry safety models deriving from invalid modeling techniques.
We demonstrate that nuclear power is market distorting because it externalizes its true costs and relies extensively on generous government subsidies.
We show that governments too often prioritize nuclear interests over democratic principles and practices: For example, we investigate media and popular resistance within Japan to the newly passed “state secrets” law, which is seen by many as directly threatening free speech and public health: See Toshihiro Okuyama and Hiroo Sunaoshi (2013, December 17) State secrets law raises concern about safety of nuclear power plants. The Asahi Shimbun,
We disclose strong public support in Japan and elsewhere for decentralized alternative energy production and we describe oligarchic energy industries’ efforts to maintain centralized control when challenged by the decentralizing production tendencies of alternative energy, such as solar: See Ex-Japanese PM on How Fukushima Meltdown was Worse than Chernobyl and Why He Now Opposes Nuclear Power. (2014, March 11). Democracy Now.
We are concerned that in the absence of public activism the choices made by governments and industry will prioritize short term profits and vested interests. “Dispossession” is the cumulative effect of these decision criteria in action.
Nuclear remains seductive in our Hobbesian world of vying nation-states, despite myriad acknowledged hazards, including aging and decaying infrastructures, recurrent nuclear “accidents,” unceasing contamination, and terrorism. Nuclear seduces even when its effluents threaten the ecosystem and, perhaps, even the human genome.
Vested nuclear interests reign, but democracy is not yet vanquished. We see public demand for systematic denuclearization as critical for long-term human sustainability. The time for political action wanes as scientists predict nuclear power plant accidents will occur with regular frequency: See Severe nuclear reactor accidents likely every 10 to 20 years, European study suggests (2012, May 22). Max-Planck-Gesellschaft
Mikhail Gorbachev noted in his Memoirs that prior to the Chernobyl disaster there had been 151 significant radiation leaks at nuclear power plants around the world.[i] He warned that one or two more accidents would produce contamination far worse than after a nuclear war.[ii] With Fukushima we are living in a highly contaminated age as research subjects with no options to discontinue the experiment.
Change in energy policy is necessary for human sustainability. If we do not denuclearize, we are going to be dispossessed.
AUDIO: Judge adds General Electric, EBASCO, Toshiba and Hitachi as defendants in nuclear radiation case
AUDIO: NUCLEAR HOTSEAT #176: USS REAGAN SAILORS’ LAWSUIT V. TEPCO CLEARS JUDICIAL HURDLE, EXPANDS! INTERVIEW:
Attorneys for the USS Reagan sailors hit by Fukushima radiation won big in court last week: Judge Janis Sammartino ruled that the $1 billion lawsuit against TEPCO for health damages and medical treatment CAN not only move forward, it adds as defendants General Electric, EBASCO, Toshiba and Hitachi – the companies that designed and built the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors. Nuclear Hotseat talks with attorneys Paul Garner and Charles Bonner………http://www.nuclearhotseat.com/2188/
US tax-payer money going to nuclear lobby’s latest gee-whiz gimmick
GE Hitachi Receives Federal Funds To Assess New Nuclear Technology, Wilmington Biz BY JENNY CALLISON, NOV 6, 2014 GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) will perform a comprehensive safety assessment of its PRISM sodium-cooled fast nuclear reactor, thanks to a multi-million-dollar federal investment from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the company announced Thursday.
GEH officials are not sure yet of the exact amount of federal funds allocated to the project, company spokesman Jon Allen said Thursday…….The technology on which PRISM is based was developed in the 1980s and, unlike other nuclear reactors, it can use spent nuclear fuel and surplus plutonium to generate electricity. Since the early 1990s, however, no risk assessments have been done on the technology……..
UK’s professor Robin Grimes knows who has the money, in the “nuclear debate”
Why aren’t the industry’s best scientists working to CONTAIN the wastes instead of working flat out and with public money to make EVER MORE?Professor Grimes came to speak to us outside saying “I’ve never had a demonstration outside where I’ve been speaking before.” He should come to the NW more often! There were only a few of us but listening to his cheerleading for the nastiest most vicious industry on earth, there should have been tens of thousands demonstrating outside…….. Continue reading
Drone flights still happening over France’s nuclear power plants
French nuclear power plant drone flights continue, model plane fans freed Golfech nuclear plant on the edge of the Garonne river between Agen and Toulouse Reuters/Regis Duvignau By RFI 8 Nov 14
The mysterious drone flights over French nuclear power stations continued on Thursday night but the authorities were no closer finding who is responsible after the release of two model plane enthusiasts arrested on Wednesday…….
the public prosecutor announced on Friday that they were just modelling enthusiasts who wanted to film a boat they had made on the lake next to the plant.
As many as five flights have taken place on the same night, leading to speculation that they are part of an organised campaign but anti-nuclear groups have denied responsibility and no-one else has confessed.
Officials did not admit publicly the flights were taking place until 24 days after the first on 5 October and are anxious to calm public fears over security. http://www.english.rfi.fr/environment/20141107-french-nuclear-power-plant-drone-flights-continue-model-plane-fans-freed
Noam Chomsky fears that NATO intervention force may spark nuclear war
Chomsky to RT: US and its NATO intervention force may spark nuclear war November 07, 2014 How dangerous is the current confrontation between Russia and the West? Noam Chomsky believes that NATO expansion and US quest for hegemony has put the world in a situation so unstable where any accidental interaction could result in a nuclear war.
‘New NATO aims to control the world’
The “new NATO” that emerged after the Soviet Union collapsed is basically a US-run intervention force, with a completely different mission as compared to the original, Chomsky tells RT’s Sophie&Co.“In fact, one might ask why NATO even continued to exist,” he said. “The official justification for NATO was that its purpose was to defend Western Europe from Russian hordes who might attack Western Europe.”……..http://rt.com/news/203055-us-russia-war-chomsky/
West Chicago needs $millions to carry out radioactive thorium cleanup
Lawmakers press for more thorium cleanup money Daily Herald, Robert Sanchez 21 Oct 14 With money running out to pay for removal of radioactive thorium waste at a former factory site in West Chicago, local officials are appealing to the federal government for help….So far, their request for as much as $40 million in federal funding for the cleanup hasn’t been granted……..
n July, the U.S. House approved legislation that provides $20 million to reimburse work at cleanup projects nationwide. Nearly $6 million of that money could be used in West Chicago.
But the Senate hasn’t approved the measure. It’s proposing legislation that would cut the funding amount to $10 million……
While the roughly 60-acre property is vacant, it used to house a factory that produced radioactive rare earth elements such as thorium for federal atomic energy and defense programs, dating to World War II.
The process created a sandlike material that the factory made available to residents for landscaping and building projects. In addition, a storm sewer from the factory site carried thorium to nearby Kress Creek and the West Branch of the DuPage River.
Then it was determined that thorium causes an increase in cancer.
Kerr-McGee, which bought the factory in 1967, started a massive cleanup to remove thorium from the waterways, hundreds of individual residential properties, Reed-Keppler Park and a wastewater treatment plant.
But after officials spent decades and roughly $1.2 billion cleaning area sites polluted with radioactive thorium waste, the environmental response trust overseeing the work doesn’t have enough money to finish the cleanup of the factory property. Two areas within the fenced site remain contaminated.,…….http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20141021/news/141029730/
Southern Hemisphere has record levels of ultraviolet radiation
Extreme levels of UV radiation in Arequipa, Peru This Week, By Agnes Rivera, 8 Nov 14 The coming months will bring the levels up to 16, the highest in the world……..According to the Regional Health Management of Environmental Health residents in Arequipa should take extra precaution this season towards UV protection.
Executive director of said agency, Zacarías Madariaga, warns that during the months of November and December, Peru’s southern region could reach radiation levels of 16, which would be the highest in the world.
“Usually the high rates are 12 and 14. However, at this time of year there are extreme levels,” says Madariaga, as quote
South Africa’s nuclear deals kept secret from Cabinet and Treasury!
Ministers in the dark on nuclear deal, Rand Daily Mail, The agreement remains a mystery to most government officials, with the cabinet subcommittee on energy security yet to see it and the Treasury still in the dark CAROL PATON 06 NOVEMBER 2014 The nuclear co-operation agreement with the Russian Federation signed six weeks ago remains a mystery to most government officials, with the cabinet subcommittee on energy security yet to see it and the Treasury still in the dark.
Director-general of energy Wolsey Barnard, the accounting officer of the department, refused to say if he had seen the document yet. But senior government officials said he had not.
The agreement was signed six weeks ago amid confusion over its contents……..http://www.rdm.co.za/business/2014/11/06/ministers-in-the-dark-on-nuclear-deal
Renewable energy threatened as US Republicans take over in the Senate
Republican wins in the US Senate bode ill for renewable energy, PV Magazine 05. NOVEMBER 2014 | BY: CHRISTIAN ROSELUNDRepublican control of both houses of the U.S. legislature is expected to lead to renewed attacks on clean energy policies and environmental law in general. However, this may not effect the course of key policies by U.S. President Barak Obama. In Tuesday’s election, the Republican Party gained at least seven seats in the U.S. Senate to bring it to a majority position. The party also increased its majority in the U.S. House of Representative, giving it control of both houses of the U.S. legislature.
While this new political landscape will have an impact on energy legislation, environmental groups have pointed out that it may not have as large an impact on clean energy policies, many of which are being pursued directly by the Obama Administration without congress.
A key area of concern for the solar industry has been the 30% solar investment tax credit (ITC), which is set to reduce at the end of 2016. The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) announced an effort to extend the ITC at the Solar Power International trade show in Las Vegas in October, and Friends of the Earth (FOE) says that this changing landscape complicates that task.
“Obviously formerly Majority Leader (Harry) Reed was very supportive of tax credits for renewable energy,” FOE Climate and Energy Program Director Benjamin Schreiber told pv magazine. “I don’t think this is a death knell for the ITC, but it makes it more difficult for sure.”
Schreiber notes that past extensions of renewable energy tax credits were part of bundled changes to the tax code, which makes it harder to read any individual politician’s support for specific policies. However, he also notes that many House Republicans have been vocal in their opposition to renewable energy subsidies………
“Anything that Congress is going to do to undermine that rule from moving forward is going to have to be signed off on by the president,” explains Schreiber. He describes past efforts to derail the policy as “political theater”.
Additionally, a Republican majority in the Senate gives the party greater control over budget issues, and Schreiber expects them to use this to reduce funding for clean energy programs both at the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense.
Perhaps the greatest concern is that a Republican majority will further tilt the playing field against renewables by increasing support for fossil fuel production. …….
Cross-generational effects of exposure to ionising radiation
Denuclearize or lose our species: Multigenerational effects of exposure to radiation http://stop-u238.blogspot.com.au/2014/11/multigenerational-effects-of-exposure.html
by Christopher Busby and Majia Nadesen
“PRESS RELEASE: Atomic Test Veteran Children and Grandchildren affected by fathers’ exposures to internal radiation from Uranium and Plutonium at the test sites”–Christopher Busby
“PRESS RELEASE: Atomic Test Veteran Children and Grandchildren affected by fathers’ exposures to internal radiation from Uranium and Plutonium at the test sites”–Christopher Busby
To hear it from Jim Stone, Fukushima poses no serious risk to civilization or to the survival of the human species. The idea is merely a profit-making myth.
“Fukushima was bad, but it is Japan’s problem. All the stories about the Pacific dying are bold faced lies spewed for ratings to generate ad revenue. You still cannot go into many of the nuclear testing zones in Russia because it is too radioactive.
“America was more careful, and does not have similar problems. The 30 KM radius around Fukushima (which extends out 100 km to the North) is Japan’s equivalent of Russia’s old testing zone, which is a big disaster for Japan. But as far as the rest of the world? It is meaningless and will stay that way no matter what happens at Fuku.”
The problem is that real experts on radiation and health, such as Christopher Busby, internationally acclaimed expert on precisely this subject, and Majia Nadesen, who has just published a book about Fukushima, have a very different story for us–one with ominous implications for the future.
Interview with Majia Nadesen on “The Real Deal” (15 October 2014):
New research has disclosed that exposure to radiation turns out to have cross-generational DNA effects that current regulations and policies do not reflect, which was not the result that was expected; and that, if we continue to rely upon nuclear weapons and nuclear energy, the survival of the species is in jeopardy, after all. Read and weep.
“Fukushima was bad, but it is Japan’s problem. All the stories about the Pacific dying are bold faced lies spewed for ratings to generate ad revenue. You still cannot go into many of the nuclear testing zones in Russia because it is too radioactive.
“America was more careful, and does not have similar problems. The 30 KM radius around Fukushima (which extends out 100 km to the North) is Japan’s equivalent of Russia’s old testing zone, which is a big disaster for Japan. But as far as the rest of the world? It is meaningless and will stay that way no matter what happens at Fuku.”
The problem is that real experts on radiation and health, such as Christopher Busby, internationally acclaimed expert on precisely this subject, and Majia Nadesen, who has just published a book about Fukushima, have a very different story for us–one with ominous implications for the future.
Interview with Majia Nadesen on “The Real Deal” (15 October 2014):
New research has disclosed that exposure to radiation turns out to have cross-generational DNA effects that current regulations and policies do not reflect, which was not the result that was expected; and that, if we continue to rely upon nuclear weapons and nuclear energy, the survival of the species is in jeopardy, after all. Read and weep.
Thorium – no prospects as an energy source, but China might use it for weapons
NUCLEAR OPTIONS: WHAT EXPLAINS U.S.-CHINA COOPERATION ON THORIUM? Georgetown Public Policy Review MATTHEW STRABONE NOVEMBER 6, 2014
Three people detained regarding drone flights over French nuclear power plants
Three detained over drone found near French nuclear plant Radio Australia 6 November 2014, Three people are detained after authorities find them with at least one drone near a French nuclear plant, officials say………The three people, believed to be aged in their 20s, were detained near a nuclear plant in Belleville-sur-Loire, some 150 kilometres south of Paris.
They were said to be in possession of at least one drone, although it had not flown over the plant.
Prosecutor Marie-Pierre Viret said the three were held for questioning over “voluntary overflight … of an aircraft in a prohibited area”.
French law bans small, civilian drones from areas such as nuclear facilities, which are protected by a no-fly zone that spans a 2.5-kilometre radius and a height of 1,000 metres.
French authorities have been left scratching their heads as unidentified drones have been flying over nuclear plants across the country………http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/2014-11-06/three-detained-over-drone-found-near-french-nuclear-plant/1386735
Raised incidence of cancers and birth defects in families of British veterans of nuclear bomb tests
New Study questions Japanese data underpinning current radiation risk model by Christopher Busby
The results of a study of the health of children and grandchildren of British servicemen stationed at the atomic weapons test sites at Maralinga in Australia and Christmas Island in the Pacific will be published in the open peer-reviewed journal Epidemiology this week. Christopher Busby and Mireille Escande de Messieres conducted a case-control and cohort study of 605 children and 749 grandchildren of members of the British Nuclear Test Veterans Association (BNTVA) and compared congenital defects and cancer incidence with 311 control children and 498 control grandchildren of age-matched individuals. Results showed that, compared with controls:
- There was three times the number (105) of miscarriages in wives of veterans.
- There was 9.7 times adverse congenital conditions (57) in veteran children.
- There was 8.4 times adverse congenital conditions (46) veteran grandchildren.
- These rates were confirmed also by comparison with national EUROCAT data.
- The existence of the same highly statistically significant rate in both generations points to genomic instability as likely cause, a trans-generational genomic switch discovered after Chernobyl and shown in animal studies to affect many generations.
- The cause is argued to be Uranium, the main atom bomb constituent, which rained out at the test sites as sub micron particles in “black rain”. Recent research shows Uranium causes genomic effects at very low radiation doses because it binds to DNA and amplifies the radiation damage both through proximity and in other ways.
- Black rain of Uranium was also a feature of the Hiroshima Atomic bomb and Uranium has been measured several kilometers from the Hiroshima epicenter. The authors re-analyse adverse birth outcome rates in the official Hiroshima database and show that rates in the control groups defined in the study as “zero dose” have twice the rate than all Japan for the post A-bomb period.
- The Ministry of Defence, in arguing recent court cases rely upon the fact that dosimeters at the test sites show low doses. However these devices do not register Uranium or other alpha emitters. Uranium was not looked for at the sites.
- The study findings are supported by similar genomic effects found in Iraq populations exposed to Depleted Uranium particles (e.g. Fallujah sex-ratio, cancer and birth defects), USA and UK Gulf veterans, Uranium miners and workers and Navajo and other local populations living near Uranium waste tailings. All of these groups show chromosome defects consistent with their exposures to Uranium.
Speaking from Riga, Latvia, Dr Busby remarks: This multi-generational effect is an unexpected finding. There are implications for the current radiation risk models which legally underpin all nuclear power development and also the use of radioactive weapons. Although weakly radioactive, when ingested and inhaled Uranium has properties which enable it to directly damage DNA in ways that are not incorporated into current legislation. Uranium was not measured at the test sites and is not routinely measured near nuclear sites or in the environments either.
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Now until to February 10, 2026 Radioactive waste storage in France: the debate is finally open! How to participate?
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