Deadly radioactive dust
In the case of Semipalatinsk, the former Soviet Union’s nuclear testing grounds, the exposure was due to the passage of radioactive clouds. The area and the people were exposed gradually not only during the passage of the cloud but also from the subsequent contamination of the area.
by beyondnuclearinternational https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2023/10/15/deadly-dust/
A look at the studies of professor Masaharu Hoshi. From Impact
The risks of radiation exposure are better understood today thanks to researchers dedicated to working with the victims of exposure, understanding their symptoms, identifying treatments and developing safety protocols. This article looks at the work of one such researcher, Dr. Masaharu Hoshi.
Harnessing atomic particles and radiation led to powerful and world changing technologies. The field of medical imaging has saved countless lives and continues to push the boundaries of medical interventions and research, which would have been impossible without the first x-ray machines. Unfortunately, not all inventions have been so altruistic.
The advent of nuclear weapons showed the world the destructive potential possible via scientific inquiry. While the dangerous effects of radiation exposure were documented from the inception of this technology, catastrophic events like the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and nuclear disasters at Chernobyl, Semipalatinsk or Fukushima provide a real-time glimpse into the long-term effects of exposure.
Investigating the causes of this exposure in order to prevent future accidents is essential, but so too is cataloguing the rates and types of exposure among the victims. With this information, correlations between exposure and health effects, both short- and long-term, can be assessed. This data is crucial for understanding the mechanisms behind radiation effects on living creatures and in assessing risks, safety protocols and treatment. Since the 1980s, Dr Masaharu Hoshi, Professor Emeritus at Hiroshima University, has been traveling around the world, visiting the sites of nuclear disasters in an effort to fully comprehend the risks. In doing so he is also revealing that there is still much we need to learn regarding the effects of radiation exposure.
Quantifying the risks
“I started my research with the people exposed to radiation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the year 1980,” says Hoshi. “Before that I completed my dissertation on nuclear physics with a specialty in radiation measurement.” This graduate training positioned him to become an expert on the effects of radiation.
The work that commenced in Hiroshima and Nagasaki right after the blast showed that with higher doses of radiation, the greater the effect on the human body, in the form of symptoms like carcinogenesis. The ratio between exposure and effects is termed risk. This measure of risk is useful in treating people exposed to radiation and it can quantify how much risk individuals face depending on the dose of exposure.
Quantifying the risks
“I started my research with the people exposed to radiation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the year 1980,” says Hoshi. “Before that I completed my dissertation on nuclear physics with a specialty in radiation measurement.” This graduate training positioned him to become an expert on the effects of radiation.
The work that commenced in Hiroshima and Nagasaki right after the blast showed that with higher doses of radiation, the greater the effect on the human body, in the form of symptoms like carcinogenesis. The ratio between exposure and effects is termed risk. This measure of risk is useful in treating people exposed to radiation and it can quantify how much risk individuals face depending on the dose of exposure.
“This work can inform us whether a medical check-up is required every two years depending on the degree of exposure, or if hospitalization is necessary if there has been too much exposure,” explains Hoshi.
He says that the work done in Japan has informed laws regarding radiation exposure safety and protocols in countries around the world, but this is only one scenario in which a person can come into contact with the deadly rays.
“The people exposed to radiation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki from the atomic bomb were exposed to gamma rays, including a few neutrons, in a short instant,” outlines Hoshi. “From 1 microsecond to about 1 minute which is quite different from the gradual exposure of actual workers in the radiation industry.”
In the case of Semipalatinsk, the former Soviet Union’s nuclear testing grounds, the exposure was due to the passage of radioactive clouds. The area and the people were exposed gradually not only during the passage of the cloud but also from the subsequent contamination of the area. “Therefore, the risk is considered to be different from that of the atomic bomb survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” confirms Hoshi.
“Because of that, we started our study on the radiation dose and the health effects occurring in Semipalatinsk, which has been going on since 1994.”
Over the course of these studies over decades he has worked with colleagues to amass databases of over 300,000 cases of exposure and long-term follow-up. It was among these cases, spread out in different locations, that a pattern emerged, revealing yet another variable to consider during an exposure event, being radioactive microparticles.
Radiation detectives
Initially in Japan, research started on people who came to the area right after the explosion to help their families and were not the direct victims of the bombing. For these individuals the calculated radiation exposure dose was less than 10 mSv which, according to Hoshi, is usually not a problem.
“Using the Hiroshima University database of people who were exposed to the bombing incident, we found that the mortality rate was higher for those who came to the vicinity directly after the explosion and the cause for this was unknown,” he states.
Furthermore, Hoshi began to see a similar pattern of exposure and symptoms in other places. In Semipalatinsk it was called Kainal Syndrome and again there was no explanation. Many of the survivors of Chernobyl, Gulf War and Hiroshima Nagasaki who entered after the bombing also suffered from hair loss, severe malaise, which can lead to an inability to work, bleeding, diarrhea and more.
“It was then that I understood I would have to use epidemiological ideas to uncover what all of these victims had in common,” he says. Eventually, he realised that commonality was radioactive dust.
Hoshi and his team began investigating the potential for radioactive microparticles to cause internal exposure in all organs of the rats, especially in the lung. They found the effects are 20 times more dangerous than usual external exposure according to the animal experiments.
“With regards to the effects of radioactive particles, some experts have previously pointed it out,” says Hoshi. “However, since there was no supporting research, it has been ignored by public institutions.”
The effects of radiation exposure are the same for every person on the planet, no one country or group of people are immune. Furthermore, when disaster strikes it is usually not contained to one spot. Contamination of air and water can spread over vast distances, bringing with them their deadly side effects. Hoshi and his collaborators are acutely aware of this and are working hard to share their data as far and as wide as possible.
Furthermore, Hoshi stresses that due to the need for a variety of expertise, collaboration is absolutely essential.
“For example, these results are not possible without the input from reactor physicists, radiation and medical physicists, epidemiologists, thyroid specialists, pathologists, medical doctors, as well as statistics and computer database experts,” he highlights.
Hoshi is grateful for all of the hard work this diverse group has done and will continue to do for the benefit of victims and potential victims. Along with further research on progressive treatment and protection, Hoshi plans to continually develop this field. Their work will carry on studying the effects of radioactive dust and ways to protect against it as well as tackling the big problem of evaluating dose exposure from radioactive dust.
This article first appeared on impact.pub whose content is available under a creative commons license.
Dr Masaharu Hoshi is Professor Emeritus at Hiroshima University’s Peace Center. You can read his studies here and here. #nuclear #antinuclear #NuclearFree #NoNukes #NuclearPlants #radiation
Low-Dose Radiation Affects Cardiovascular Disease Risk in Human Aortic Endothelial Cells by Altering Gene Expression under Normal and Diabetic Conditions.
#nuclear #Nuclear-free #anti-nuclear #NoNukes
by Soo-Ho Lee 1,†, Ye Ji Jeong 1,†, Jeongwoo Park 1,2, Hyun-Yong Kim 1, Yeonghoon Son 1, Kwang Seok Kim 1,* and Hae-June Lee 1,*
Divisions of Radiation Biomedical Research, Korea Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences, Seoul 01812, Korea
2 New Drug Development Center, Daegu Gyeongbuk Medical Innovation Foundation, Daegu 41061, Korea
*Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
†These authors contributed equally to this work.
2 August 2022 (This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Radiation Toxicity)
Abstract
High doses of ionizing radiation can cause cardiovascular diseases (CVDs); however, the effects of <100 mGy radiation on CVD remain underreported. Endothelial cells (ECs) play major roles in cardiovascular health and disease, and their function is reduced by stimuli such as chronic disease, metabolic disorders, and smoking. However, whether exposure to low-dose radiation results in the disruption of similar molecular mechanisms in ECs under diabetic and non-diabetic states remains largely unknown; we aimed to address this gap in knowledge through the molecular and functional characterization of primary human aortic endothelial cells (HAECs) derived from patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D-HAECs) and normal HAECs in response to low-dose radiation. To address these limitations, we performed RNA sequencing on HAECs and T2D-HAECs following exposure to 100 mGy of ionizing radiation and examined the transcriptome changes associated with the low-dose radiation. Compared with that in the non-irradiation group, low-dose irradiation induced 243 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) (133 down-regulated and 110 up-regulated) in HAECs and 378 DEGs (195 down-regulated and 183 up-regulated) in T2D-HAECs. We also discovered a significant association between the DEGs and the interferon (IFN)-I signaling pathway, which is associated with CVD by Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis, protein–protein network analysis, and module analysis. Our findings demonstrate the potential impact of low-dose radiation on EC functions that are related to the risk of CVD.
Keywords: low-dose radiation; endothelial cells; diabetes mellitus; gene profiling; cardiovascular disease …………………………………………………………………………….more https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/23/15/8577
Fukushima Study Links Low-Dose Radiation to Diabetes
Mirage, 3 Oct 23
New research to be presented at this year’s Annual Meeting of The European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD), Hamburg (2-6 Oct), suggests that exposure to low doses of radiation may contribute to an increased risk of diabetes.
The study by Dr Huan Hu and Dr Toshiteru Ohkubo from the Japanese National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health involved more than 6,000 out of around 20,000 emergency workers who responded to the radiation accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, which was hit by a huge tsunami in March 2011.
Substantial amounts of radioactive materials were released into the environment following explosions at the nuclear plant.
In 2014, the Epidemiological Study of Health Effects in Fukushima Emergency Workers (NEWS) was established to clarify the long-term health effects of radiation among emergency workers.
Few human studies have examined the impact of radiation exposure on diabetes development, particularly at low doses. To find out more, researchers examined the association between low-dose radiation exposure and risk of diabetes in 5,326 male emergency workers (average age 46 years) taking part in the NEWS study.
Between March and December 2011, individual emergency worker’s radiation exposure was measured using a pocket alarm dosemeter for external exposure and a whole-body counter for internal exposure.
Study participants underwent regular health examinations involving more than 70 components, including blood sugar, lipids, urine tests, inflammation biomarkers, thyroid function tests, and eye examinations.
Between 2012 and 2021, 392 participants developed diabetes—defined as a fast plasma glucose level of at least 126 mg/dL, an HbA1c level of at least 6.5%, or self-reported diagnosis of diabetes.
The researchers assessed the association between incident diabetes and cumulative radiation exposure after adjusting for a wide range of potential confounders including age, body mass index, smoking, alcohol consumption, leisure-time physical activity, employment at the nuclear power plant, dyslipidaemia (abnormally high levels of fats in the blood), and high blood pressure.
The analysis found that compared with the lowest cumulative low-dose radiation exposure (0-4 millisieverts [mSv]), the risk of developing diabetes was 6% higher for workers exposed to 5-9 mSv, and 47% and 33% greater for those exposed to 10-19 mSv and 20-49 mSv, respectively.
However, no elevated risk was detected in those exposed to radiation doses of 50 mSv or higher, likely due to the small sample size in this group.
“Our findings suggest an increased risk of diabetes among nuclear emergency workers from low levels of radiation. While the potential mechanisms remain somewhat unclear, reports suggest that radiation can adversely affect pancreatic cells responsible for insulin production, potentially contributing to diabetes. Additionally, there is an association between radiation exposure and heightened inflammation, a well-known factor in insulin resistance and the development of diabetes”, explains lead author Dr Hu.
He adds, “Ongoing follow-up of NEWS participants will provide an even clearer picture of diabetes risk at low radiation doses. As more diabetes cases emerge within our study group, our expanded dataset will enable more robust analyses, allowing researchers to better assess the link between radiation exposure and diabetes risk.”……………………………………………………………………………………………………….. more https://www.miragenews.com/fukushima-study-links-low-dose-radiation-to-1095852/
The Ukrainian Morale in the Battlefield: A Snapshot
Pepe Escobar. September 19, 2023 https://strategic-culture.su/news/2023/09/19/the-ukrainian-morale-in-the-battlefield-a-snapshot/
It’s now firmly established that the Ukrainian counter-offensive turned out to be the feeder of a bloody meat grinder of astonishing proportions
Of every 100 people who joined Ukrainian units last Fall, months before the counter-offensive, only 10 to 20 remain. The rest are dead, wounded or incapacitated. These stats were confirmed by the online publication Poltavashchyna.
It’s quite enlightening to check the following snapshot of the Ukrainian frontlines only five months ago, in Spring, slightly before the start of the counter-offensive. The data was leaked by Ukrainians. The authenticity of the documents has been fully confirmed.
This is a report prepared by the temporary acting commander of the 2nd mechanized battalion of military unit A4007, Captain Dmytro Bilyi. He is reporting directly to the commander of the military unit.
Bilyi says that between April 19 and 20, 2023, he as temporary acting commander as well as other officers have concluded that the 2nd battalion had reached critically low morale and psychological conditions.
The battalion had also suffered numerous sanitary and irretrievable losses. Most soldiers refused to perform combat missions. The level of morale in different companies was evaluated as ranging between 20% and 42%.
( Report supplied on the original – in Ukrainian)
This is a list of soldiers from military unit A7097 who have voluntarily left a position called “Sadik”. Translation: the Ukrainians lost control over this strong point, Sadik, because of these guys. Among them there is a Captain, Mykhailo Shabunin.
(List supplied on original)
This is another report about a group of soldiers who have “voluntarily” abandoned the battlefield. (List supplied on original)
This is an urgent report on the critically low level of combat readiness of the 5th company of the 2nd battalion. The staffing of the company fell to 60% – and the unit needs to be withdrawn from the frontline. ( List supplied on original)
This is the personal data of 10 servicemen that left. So relatives and friends can actually get some info about soldiers. (provided on original)
This is an urgent report by Major Dmytro Hnatyuk, commander of the 2nd batallion on massive “voluntary” withdrawing of firing positions Yaremche, Dakh, Derevo, Polohy, Halych.
Hnatyuk managed to get some 10 soldiers to return to their positions. The rest didn’t.
What next?
The documents above paint a clear picture of what was going on in the frontlines back in April. The situation now may be even more dire. The Ukrainians already started their counteroffensive with very low morale. No wonder the actual results were catastrophic.
And yet none of that should elicit complacency. There’s a feeling that as it stands all’s quiet in the Donbass front. Not really. Ukrainians continue to assault Russian positions with maniacal persistence. After all they dispose of infinite numbers of infantry – faithful to Kiev’s “logic” of war to the last Ukrainian.
The Kiev machine is now being retooled, and new units are being prepared. Russians did destroy an astonishing number of Western weaponry, but Kiev’s forces are not depleted – yet.
There was quite a lot of expectation that after the failed counter-offensive Kiev would negotiate. That won’t happen. The Hegemon won’t allow it. So the “counter-offensive”, 2.0 or whatever, will continue. Kiev’s forces are getting ready for renewed action before the Summer of 2024. So Russia better get its own devastating offensive rolling – sooner rather than later.
Never forget: the Hegemon’s Plan A is yet another Forever War. There’s no Plan B.
Important new BMJ article increases our perception of radiation risks
September 3, 2023
The BMJ article which was published on Aug 16, 2023 (accessible free of charge) is the result of a lengthy occupational study by US Professor David Richardson and a team of 11 academics and public health researchers in the US, UK, France and Spain. https://www.bmj.com/content/382/bmj-2022-074520
Its conclusion states
“This major update to INWORKS provides a direct estimate of the association between protracted low dose exposure to ionising radiation and solid cancer mortality based on some of the world’s most informative cohorts of radiation workers. The summary estimate of excess relative rate solid cancer mortality per Gy is larger than estimates currently informing radiation protection, and some evidence suggests a steeper slope for the dose-response association in the low dose range than over the full dose range. These results can help to strengthen radiation protection, especially for low dose exposures that are of primary interest in contemporary medical, occupational, and environmental settings.”
In a nutshell, the article’s findings
- substantially increase our perception of radiogenic risks
- confirm that the linear no threshold model for radiation risks is acceptable
- give new hard evidence of increased risks at low levels of exposure
- act to question the continued use of the LSS studies of Japanese bomb survivors in deriving absolute radiation risks for the public
- act to question the ICRP’s continued use of DDREFs which at present halve radiation risks, and
- act to put pressure on ICRP, WHO, IAEA, etc to revise upwards the current low risks of radiation.
DISCUSSION
- Numerical Risk of Radiation…………………………………………………………………………………………………..So it can be shown that the INWORKS study increases the currently perceived absolute risk of fatal cancer in the UK from ~ 5% to 13% per Sv. This is a substantial increase and will need to be addressed by the ICRP and national authorities.
- 2. Strengthens and Increases the risks found older studies. Second, the new study strengthens an earlier 2018 study (Richardson et al, 2018) by the same team by adding another 10 years’ data to the epidemiology datasets used in the metastudy. It not only strengthens the findings but actually increases the observed ERR risk by ~10% ie from 0.47 to 0.52 per Gy.
- 3. Increased Risks at Low Doses. Perhaps most significant, are the study’s findings of higher risks at very low doses between 0 and 150 mGy which are the doses we need to be concerned with………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………more https://www.ianfairlie.org/news/important-new-bmj-article-increases-our-perception-of-radiation-risks/?fbclid=IwAR0TtpWfyxm1ebiaHGw_eUJd1n1PWRfkmGF3n-YtBnO0rMIRi2XqcPzYYWY
We are all Hibakusha- the global footprint of nuclear fallout
By M.V. Ramana https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2023/09/03/we-are-all-hibakusha/
The front page of the Times of India of August 7, 1945, carried the headline World’s deadliest bomb hits Japan: Carries blast power of 20,000 tons of TNT. For millions around the world, headlines of that sort would have been their first intimation of the process of nuclear fission on a large scale.
But, a careful stratigrapher, who studies layers in the soil or rock, might be able to discern that, in fact, nuclear fission had occurred in July 1945. The stratigrapher would just have to look for plutonium at Crawford Lake in Ontario, Canada, the site proposed as the “golden spike” spot to mark the start of the Anthropocene (recognising the problems with its definition as highlighted in Down To Earth’s interview with Amitav Ghosh).
What happened in July 1945 was, of course, Trinity, the world’s first nuclear weapon test, now familiar to many through the film Oppenheimer. A group of researchers recently reconstructed how the plutonium released during that explosion would have been transported by the wind. They calculated that direct radioactive fallout from that test would have reached Crawford Lake within four days of the test, “on July 20, 1945 before peaking on July 22, 1945”.
Since Crawford Lake is nearly 3,000 kilometres from the Trinity test site in New Mexico, it stands to reason that many other places would also have received radioactive fallout from the Trinity test. Now consider the fact that there have been at least 528 nuclear weapon tests around the world that took place above the ground, plus the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki—and you can easily imagine how radioactive fallout must have fallen practically everywhere, whether on land or in the oceans.
Not included in the abovementioned list of 528 is the debated 1979 “Vela incident” that most likely involved an Israeli nuclear weapon test with help from South Africa. It is described as debated only because political elites in the United States, whose Vela satellite 6911 detected a double-flash of light that is characteristic of nuclear explosions, did not want to impose sanctions on Israel.
In 2018, two scientists collected a range of evidence consistent with such a nuclear test, importantly cases of radioactive element iodine-131 that was found in the thyroids of some sheep in 1979—in the south east part of Australia, across the oceans. Again, proof that radioactive fallout from nuclear weapon tests spread out globally.
But it is not just nuclear weapons tests. Accidents at nuclear power plants, too, have produced radioactive fallout that has contaminated the peoples of the world. Radioactive cesium released by the 1986 Chernobyl reactor explosion was found in multiple countries across Western Europe. Yet again, sheep, this time in England, Scotland and Wales, were contaminated, and for a time scientists could not even understand the behaviour of the radioactive cesium that the sheep were ingesting.
The sheep remained contaminated for decades. Restrictions on sheep were lifted in all areas only in 2012. Of course, closer to Chernobyl, many areas are still highly contaminated. Radiation levels go up and down depending on outside events, such as forest fires or the Russian army invading the area.
Even without nuclear weapons explosions and reactor accidents, people around the world are exposed to radioactive materials—from reprocessing plants. These facilities chemically process the irradiated spent fuel from nuclear power plants, while also producing very large volumes of liquid and gaseous radioactive effluents. These effluents are released into the air; exposure to these constitutes the largest component of the radiation dose to “members of the public from radionuclides released in effluents from the nuclear fuel cycle”.
People in South Asia have, of course, been exposed to radioactive fallout from nuclear explosions conducted by other countries, nuclear reactor accidents, and reprocessing plants. What about the nuclear weapons exploded by India and Pakistan in 1998, and by India, in 1974? All of these weapons were exploded underground, which should, in principle, have contained all the radioactive materials within the soil. If so, their route for exposing people to radiation can only be by contaminating underground water sources, sometime in the future.
But underground nuclear weapon tests do, sometimes, vent, releasing radioactive materials into the air. After the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963, all US nuclear weapons tests were designed to completely contain the radioactivity underground. Nevertheless, 105 of them vented radioactive materials into the atmosphere. A further 287 tests had “operational releases” whereby radioactivity was released during routine post-test activities. Similarly, several hundred underground nuclear weapons explosions at the Novaya Zemlya test site in the Soviet Union released radioactivity into the atmosphere.
Radioactive materials from these releases spread far and wide. In 1970, radioactive materials vented during the Baneberry test were detected as far as Canada; but Canadian diplomats told US officials that “they had no intention to make a formal protest or to conceive of the event as a violation” of the Limited Test Ban Treaty.
It is possible, though not very probable, that the 1998 or the 1974 nuclear tests vented radioactivity. One reason to suspect venting is that residents of the villages near Pokhran, India have repeatedly complained of different kinds of physical illnesses, and demanded that radiation levels be checked. So far, no comprehensive and independent examination of the health of these people or the radioactivity levels in the area has been conducted.
Nearly eight decades since the nuclear age started, people around the world, not to mention the flora and fauna, have all been exposed to radioactive materials from nuclear activities. Any exposure to radioactivity elevates the risk of developing cancer or cardiovascular disease, two great health scourges in modern times.
We are all, in the words of Robert “Bo” Jacobs, the “Global Hibakusha”, survivors of the nuclear age but always at risk of developing one of the diseases associated with radiation exposure. And the worldwide spread of fallout is not, as Jacobs points out, “something that happened, it is something that is still happening”.
OPENING THE FLOOD GATES AT FUKUSHIMA
Discharging radioactive water from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is avoidable, risky and potentially illegal
By Sarah Hachman and Associate Professor Tilman Ruff AO, University of Melbourne, 29 Aug 23 https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/opening-the-flood-gates-at-fukushima
The Japanese government intends to discharge all 1.34 million tonnes of wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, an operation that began on 24 August 2023. Presumably, it also plans to discharge the wastewater that will continue to accumulate over the coming decades.
This decision is not only harmful to human and environmental health but is also in direct violation of international law.
The original announcement, made in 2021, came 10 years after a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami struck Japan’s east coast, damaging the cooling mechanisms at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (FDNPS) and causing three nuclear reactors to meltdown.
The destruction of the FDNPS released an estimated 520 Peta Becquerels (520 x 10¹⁵ nuclear decays per second) of various radionuclides (radioactive elements) into the atmosphere, including cesium, carbon-14, iodine-129, and tritium. However, this figure excludes noble gases such as xenon-133, of which the Fukushima release was the largest since atmospheric nuclear bomb tests.
AN INCOMPLETE CLEAN-UP
Following the incident, the Japanese government worked with the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) on a plan to decommission the plant, efforts which continue to this day.
The first step of this process was to ensure the reactors remained stable. As such, ocean water was pumped into the reactors as a replacement for the now-defunct cooling mechanisms. Though necessary, this process, along with extensive groundwater leakage, has produced over one million tonnes of irradiated wastewater, which continues to accumulate daily.
This wastewater is being decontaminated using an Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS), a filtration process intended to remove 62 radionuclides from water using a series of chemical reactions. However, this system’s consistent effectiveness, even with repeated treatment, has not yet been demonstrated, and ALPS is incapable of eliminating tritium and carbon-14.
As of July 2023, the ALPS-treated wastewater was being stored on-site in 1,046 storage tanks that are nearing capacity, hence the claimed need for ocean discharge.
The Japanese government plans to incrementally discharge the treated wastewater into the Pacific Ocean over the next 30 to 40 years. Though presented with other disposal options, such as long-term storage in purpose-built, seismically-safe tanks and solidifying the water in a leakproof form such as mortar or concrete, the task force declined to explore these avenues due to complexity and cost.
Even after initial cleaning, 70 per cent of the stored wastewater contains levels of radionuclides above regulatory standards, in some cases up to 20,000 times higher. And it’s not just tritium (more on this substance below) in this water, there are other, more toxic, substances, such as cesium-137, strontium-90 and cobalt-60.
However, the IAEA found that Japan’s plans “are consistent with IAEA Safety Standards” and that the levels of tritium, carbon-14, and other potential radioactive contaminants will be within international standards when discharged, without TEPCO having demonstrated its water cleaning can consistently achieve this.
Dilution of the wastewater as planned to meet regulatory limits will not alter the total amount of materials released, which is the key factor.
TEPCO estimates the annual radiation dose to people from the discharged water would be lower than that of a dental x-ray or a round-trip flight from New York City to Tokyo.
However, TEPCO’s checkered history gives little grounds for confidence in its assurances.
NOT ENOUGH EVIDENCE OF SAFETY
Despite reassurance from the IAEA, the scientific community remains divided on the decision, citing growing evidence of how tritium may impact human and environmental health.
Moreover, environmental scientists have argued that the amount considered to be an environmentally safe level of radiation is more political than scientific. National standards invariably lag behind the science, and regulatory limits for tritium in water vary from as much as 7000 Bq/L (Becquerels per litre) in Canada to 15 Bq/L in California.
Tritium is a naturally occurring, radioactive form of hydrogen also produced by nuclear reactors and explosions. It is the largest radioactive byproduct of nuclear power plants. It reacts with oxygen to create tritiated water, which is why ALPS is unable to filter it. Tritium exposure has been largely considered to be harmless in low concentrations and, when ingested, tritiated water is processed in the body identically to water.
There is strong evidence, however, that tritium, particularly organically-bound forms, may have lasting health effects similar to other forms of radiation exposure, such as decreased lifespan, developmental delays and cognitive deficits, immunodeficiency, infertility and birth defects, and cancer and DNA mutations among humans, land animals and aquatic vertebrates and invertebrates who experienced high or prolonged exposure.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection considers tritium’s beta radiation overall to be twice as biologically damaging as X-rays, and organically-bound tritium three times as damaging as tritium incorporated into water.
Though the task force has committed to monitoring tritium exposure in aquatic animals, TEPCO noted that “fish tritium measurement is very difficult and there are only a few analysis agencies that are capable of performing this measurement,” and that reports from these agencies are often conflicting, making this an insufficient risk mitigation strategy.
ILLEGAL UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW
Japan joined both the 1972 London Convention to prevent marine pollution by waste dumping, and also the 1996 Protocol which specifically prohibits the marine dumping of radioactive waste. In 1996, Japan ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), an international agreement that established a framework for maritime activities.
By ratifying UNCLOS, Japan committed itself to “protect and preserve the marine environment” and abstain from polluting waterways from “land-based sources”.
Additionally, in 1992 Japan committed to the Rio Declaration, a collection of goals created by the UN targeting sustainable development and environmental protection that heavily emphasises the precautionary principle. Article 15 states: “where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation.”
Though there is still debate within the scientific community surrounding the effects of tritium and what constitutes an acceptable level of radiation exposure, two truths remain. One, Japan has committed itself to environmental protection, and two, the contaminated wastewater is a land-based source of pollution.
Furthermore, the very existence of the debate on tritium’s safety and the knowledge that the discharged water will contain other, more harmful radioactive pollutants, requires Japan to employ the precautionary principle just as they agreed to in 1992.
The Japanese government moving forward with the discharge plan, disregarding its commitments to the global community and international efforts for environmental protection sets a precedent for how the global community responds to modern nuclear crises.
Approving this plan means approving a compromise on human and environmental health, inflicting a transboundary and transgenerational problem on peoples around the Pacific with no offsetting benefit or say in the decision, and a failure to engage state and non-state actors with stakes in the nuclear industry to question what’s acceptable.
As such, the Japanese government must follow through on its commitments to the international community and critically consider alternatives for wastewater disposal. The discharge is planned to go on for 30-40 years and radioactive wastewater will continue to accumulate.
Even though it has already started, it can still be stopped and a better alternative implemented.
Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station is still continuing to release radioactive materials
A new argument for considering the issue of contaminated ALPS water release .
This brief examines the amount of radioactive material that has been
leaking from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station ever since the
meltdowns occurred more than 12 years ago.
It is huge. Both TEPCO and the
government are undoubtedly aware of this reality. Despite this, they are
now attempting to release even the radioactive materials they have been
able to manage in tanks to the outside world. While attention focuses on
this release, this brief attempts to highlight the even larger problems of
Fukushima Daiichi and the irresponsible way the authorities are dealing
with them.
CNIC 23rd Aug 2023
Exposure to Low-Dose Ionizing Radiation Linked to Solid Cancer Mortality
Elana Gotkine Aug 21, 2023 https://www.applevalleynewsnow.com/news/health/exposure-to-low-dose-ionizing-radiation-linked-to-solid-cancer-mortality/article_6ed70b06-3ba4-549e-828c-e2892b462550.html
(HealthDay News) — Protracted exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation is associated with an increased risk for solid cancer mortality, according to a study published online Aug. 16 in The BMJ.
David B. Richardson, Ph.D., from the University of California in Irvine, and colleagues examined the effect of protracted low-dose exposure to ionizing radiation on the risk for cancer in a multinational cohort study involving workers in the nuclear industry in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Participants included 309,932 workers with individual monitoring data for external exposure to ionizing radiation, with follow-up of 10.7 million person-years.
The researchers identified 103,553 deaths, including 28,089 due to solid cancers. There was a 52 percent increase in the estimated rate of mortality due to solid cancer with cumulative dose per Gy, which lagged by 10 years. The estimate of association was approximately doubled on restriction of the analysis to the low cumulative dose range (0 to 100 mGy) and with restricting the analysis to workers hired in more recent years, when estimates of occupational external radiation were more accurate. The estimated magnitude of the association was modestly affected by exclusion of deaths from lung cancer and pleural cancer, indirectly indicating that the association was not substantially confounded by smoking or asbestos exposure.
“The study provides evidence in support of a linear association between protracted low-dose external exposure to ionizing radiation and solid cancer mortality,” the authors write.
Risk of cancer death after exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation underestimated, suggests nuclear industry study
by British Medical Journal, 16 Aug 23, https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-08-cancer-death-exposure-low-dose-ionizing.html
Prolonged exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation is associated with a higher risk of death from cancer than previously thought, suggests research tracking the deaths of workers in the nuclear industry, published in The BMJ.
The findings should inform current rules on workplace protection from low-dose radiation, say the researchers.
To date, estimates of the effects of radiation on the risk of dying from cancer have been based primarily on studies of survivors of atomic bombs dropped on Japan at the end of the Second World War.
These estimates are used to set the level of protection required for workers regularly exposed to much lower doses of radiation in the nuclear industry and other sectors such as health care.
But the latest data from the International Nuclear Workers Study (INWORKS) suggest that risk estimates, based on the acute exposures among atomic bomb survivors to an extremely high dose of radiation, may underestimate the cancer risks from exposure to much lower doses of ionizing radiation delivered over a prolonged period in the workplace.
The researchers therefore tracked and analyzed deaths among 309,932 workers in the nuclear industry in the UK, France, and the US (INWORKS) for whom individual monitoring data for external exposure to ionizing radiation were available.
During a monitoring period spanning 1944 to 2016, 103,553 workers died: 28,089 of these deaths were due to solid cancers, which include most cancers other than leukemia.
The researchers then used this information to estimate the risk of death from solid cancers based on workers’ exposure to radiation 10 years previously.
They estimated that this risk increased by 52% for every unit of radiation (Gray; Gy) workers had absorbed. A dose of one Gray is equivalent to a unit of one Joule of energy deposited in a kilogram of a substance.
But when the analysis was restricted to workers who had been exposed to the lowest cumulative doses of radiation (0-100 mGy), this approximately doubled the risk of death from solid cancers per unit Gy absorbed.
Similarly, restricting the analysis only to workers hired in more recent years when estimates of occupational external penetrating radiation dose were more accurate also increased the risk of death from solid cancer per unit Gy absorbed.
Excluding deaths from cancers of the lung and lung cavity, which might be linked to smoking or occupational exposure to asbestos, had little effect on the strength of the association.
The researchers acknowledge some limitations to their findings, including that exposures for workers employed in the early years of the nuclear industry may have been poorly estimated, despite their efforts to account for subsequent improvements in dosimeter technology—a device for measuring exposure to radiation.
They also point out that the separate analysis of deaths restricted to workers hired in more recent years found an even higher risk of death from solid cancer per unit Gy absorbed, meaning that the increased risk observed in the full cohort wasn’t driven by workers employed in the earliest years of the industry. There were also no individual level data on several potentially influential factors, including smoking.
“People often assume that low dose rate exposures pose less carcinogenic hazard than the high dose rate exposures experienced by the Japanese atomic bomb survivors,” write the researchers. “Our study does not find evidence of reduced risk per unit dose for solid cancer among workers typically exposed to radiation at low dose rates.”
They hope that organizations such as the International Commission on Radiological Protection will use their results to inform their assessment of the risks of low dose, and low dose rate, radiation and ultimately in an update of the system of radiological protection.
More information: Cancer mortality after low dose exposure to ionising radiation in workers in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States (INWORKS): cohort study, The BMJ (2023). DOI: 10.1136/bmj-2022-074520
Journal information: British Medical Journal (BMJ)
Huge study of nuclear workers in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States confirms low dose radiation as a cause of cancer.
What this study adds
- The results of an updated study of nuclear workers in France, the UK, and the US suggest a linear increase in the relative rate of cancer with increasing exposure to radiation
- Some evidence suggested a steeper slope for the dose-response association at lower doses than over the full dose range
- The risk per unit of radiation dose for solid cancer was larger in analyses restricted to the low dose range (0-100 mGy) and to workers hired in the more recent years of operations
Cancer mortality after low dose exposure to ionising radiation in workers in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States (INWORKS): cohort study
BMJ 2023; 382 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2022-074520 (Published 16 August 2023)Cite this as: BMJ 2023;382:e074520
David B Richardson, professor1, Klervi Leuraud, head of service2, Dominique Laurier, deputy director of health2, Michael Gillies, medical statistician3, Richard Haylock, senior research scientist3, Kaitlin Kelly-Reif, senior research scientist4, Stephen Bertke, research statistician4, Robert D Daniels, senior research scientist4, Isabelle Thierry-Chef, senior research scientist5, Monika Moissonnier, research assistant6, Ausrele Kesminiene, senior visiting scientist6, Mary K Schubauer-Berigan, programme head6
Abstract
Objective To evaluate the effect of protracted low dose, low dose rate exposure to ionising radiation on the risk of cancer.
Design Multinational cohort study.
Setting Cohorts of workers in the nuclear industry in France, the UK, and the US included in a major update to the International Nuclear Workers Study (INWORKS).
Participants 309 932 workers with individual monitoring data for external exposure to ionising radiation and a total follow-up of 10.7 million person years.
Main outcome measures Estimates of excess relative rate per gray (Gy) of radiation dose for mortality from cancer.
Results The study included 103 553 deaths, of which 28 089 were due to solid cancers. The estimated rate of mortality due to solid cancer increased with cumulative dose by 52% (90% confidence interval 27% to 77%) per Gy, lagged by 10 years. Restricting the analysis to the low cumulative dose range (0-100 mGy) approximately doubled the estimate of association (and increased the width of its confidence interval), as did restricting the analysis to workers hired in the more recent years of operations when estimates of occupational external penetrating radiation dose were recorded more accurately. Exclusion of deaths from lung cancer and pleural cancer had a modest effect on the estimated magnitude of association, providing indirect evidence that the association was not substantially confounded by smoking or occupational exposure to asbestos.
Conclusions This major update to INWORKS provides a direct estimate of the association between protracted low dose exposure to ionising radiation and solid cancer mortality based on some of the world’s most informative cohorts of radiation workers. The summary estimate of excess relative rate solid cancer mortality per Gy is larger than estimates currently informing radiation protection, and some evidence suggests a steeper slope for the dose-response association in the low dose range than over the full dose range. These results can help to strengthen radiation protection, especially for low dose exposures that are of primary interest in contemporary medical, occupational, and environmental settings.
Conclusions This major update to INWORKS provides a direct estimate of the association between protracted low dose exposure to ionising radiation and solid cancer mortality based on some of the world’s most informative cohorts of radiation workers. The summary estimate of excess relative rate solid cancer mortality per Gy is larger than estimates currently informing radiation protection, and some evidence suggests a steeper slope for the dose-response association in the low dose range than over the full dose range. These results can help to strengthen radiation protection, especially for low dose exposures that are of primary interest in contemporary medical, occupational, and environmental settings.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Discussion
This study, which involved a major update to an international cohort mortality study of radiation dosimeter monitored workers, reports evidence of an increase in the excess relative rate of solid cancer mortality with increasing cumulative exposure to ionising radiation at the low dose rates typically encountered by French, UK, and US nuclear workers. The study provides evidence in support of a linear association between protracted low dose external exposure to ionising radiation and solid cancer mortality.
…………………………………………………
What is already known on this topic
- Ionising radiation is an established cause of cancer
- The primary quantitative basis for radiation protection standards comes from studies of people exposed to acute, high doses of ionising radiation
What this study adds
- The results of an updated study of nuclear workers in France, the UK, and the US suggest a linear increase in the relative rate of cancer with increasing exposure to radiation
- Some evidence suggested a steeper slope for the dose-response association at lower doses than over the full dose range
- The risk per unit of radiation dose for solid cancer was larger in analyses restricted to the low dose range (0-100 mGy) and to workers hired in the more recent years of operations
Japan mothers’ group fears Fukushima water release could revive health concerns
By Kiyoshi Takenaka, Akiko Okamoto and Tom Bateman, August 18, 2023
IWAKI, Japan, Aug 17 (Reuters) – Waves crashing on a Japanese beach lashed a man and a woman wearing waders and hats as they demonstrated the use of a blue bucket to scoop some of the liquid into large plastic containers to be taken away and tested for radiation.
Members of a group that tracks such levels in food and seawater, they fear Japan’s plans to release treated radioactive water into the sea near the Fukushima nuclear plant could stir an anxiety among residents reminiscent of the 2011 disaster.
“The people of Fukushima endured the risks for the last 12 years and have confirmed the radiation level has dropped,” said Ai Kimura, director of non-profit group Mothers’ Radiation Lab Fukushima, also known as Tarachine.
“But if radioactive materials are released into the ocean now, it will again bring back the tragedy of 12 years ago,” she added, speaking at the lab in the city of Iwaki, 50 km (30 miles) south of the power plant.
Japan is preparing this summer to start discharging into the Pacific more than a million tons of water from the tsunami-crippled power plant, but has not yet revealed the date.
Although the government and an international nuclear regulator say the plan is safe, it has alarmed neighbours, particularly China, and the regional fisheries industry.
Tarachine comprises 13 members – mostly mothers – who had no experience in radiology when they started, but were taught by scientists and doctors how to run tests and keep records.
After losing a job cooking school lunches in the wake of the disaster, Kimura joined the group in 2014 and taught herself how to measure radiation, in hopes of protecting her daughters, who were teenagers at the time, as well as others.
Now she says she wants more dialogue between the government and plant operator Tokyo Electric Power (9501.T) on one side, and citizens, fishermen and others on the other, to allay concerns over safety and other fears.
“Since the ocean has no walls … and what’s been released can’t be taken back, this issue is not only for Fukushima or for Japan to give consideration to, but for the whole world,” Kimura added.
…………… Kimura’s group vowed to continue its activities after the release begins.
“We will keep on providing data, so that fathers and mothers can decide for themselves, and children can also decide, when they grow up, whether to eat Fukushima fish or whether to go swimming in the sea,” Kimura said.
Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka, Akiko Okamoto and Tom Bateman; Editing by Chang-Ran Kim and Clarence Fernandez https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/japan-mothers-group-fears-fukushima-water-release-could-revive-health-concerns-2023-08-17/
Medical Journals Issue Urgent Call for Elimination of Nuclear Weapons
August 10th, 2023
More than 100 medical journals, including the Lancet, the British Medical Journal, the New England Journal of Medicine, and the JAMA, have issued a joint call for urgent steps to decrease the growing danger of nuclear war and to move rapidly to the elimination of nuclear weapons. At a time of expanded fighting in Ukraine and increased tensions in Korea, leaders of the global health community underscore that any use of nuclear weapons would be catastrophic for humanity. https://peaceandhealthblog.com/2023/08/02/medical-journals-issue-urgent-call-for-elimination-of-nuclear-weapons/
The unprecedented call to action comes in the form of an editorial co-authored by the editors of 11 of the leading medical and health journals, the World Association of Medical Editors and leaders of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). The editorial was released on August 1st in conjunction with the start of the United Nations Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Preparatory Committee Meeting and the 78th year since the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. https://meetings.unoda.org/npt-/treaty-on-the-non-proliferation-of-nuclear-weapons-preparatory-committee-for-the-eleventh-review-conference-first-session-2023
The editorial warns, “The danger is great and growing. The nuclear armed states must eliminate their nuclear arsenals before they eliminate us.”………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… more http://nuclearactive.org/medical-journals-issue-urgent-call-for-elimination-of-nuclear-weapons/
Still more information about Tritium
Many citizens do not realize that SMNRs (Small Modular Nuclear Reactors) produce all of the same kinds of radioactive wastes that traditional larger reactors do – high-level waste (irradiated nuclear fuel), medium-level waste (e.g. decommissioning waste resulting from the dismantling of reactor structures), and low-level waste. This particular post is about tritium.
by Gordon Edwards, 9 Aug 23
By far the most radioactive objects produced by any nuclear reactor, large or small, are the intensely radioactive used nuclear fuel elements. A used nuclear fuel bundle is one of the most dangerous objects on Earth. It can give a lethal gamma radiation dose to any unshielded human being in a short time, even after “cooling off” for several decades.
But even after all the irradiated nuclear fuel (high-level radioactive waste) has been removed from the reactor there is still a large volume of dangerous radioactive waste left behind – including the activation products that are created in the core area of the reactor. Two of the most biologically and environmentally mobile radioactive activation products are tritium (radioactive hydrogen) and carbon-14 (radioactive carbon).
(1) Tritium is radioactive hydrogen. A tritium atom is three times heavier than a normal hydrogen atom, but the two are otherwise chemically identical. Any chemical compounds formed with ordinary hydrogen can equally well use tritium instead. The only fundamental difference is that tritium atoms disintegrate (explode), while other hydrogen atoms do not disintegrate. When a tritium atom explodes it gives off a beta particle, but there are no gamma rays. It is a “pure” beta emitter.
(2) For example, a normal water molecule H2O is not radioactive. Tritiated water is radioactive because one or both of the hydrogen atoms in H2O has been replaced by a tritium atom. So when you drink or inhale or otherwise absorb tritiated water, the tritium atoms are disintegrating inside your body. Your cells are being bombarded with beta particles from disintegrating tritium atoms.
(3) Chemically, radioactive water molecules are no different than ordinary water molecules. It is not possible to separate out the tritiated water molecules by filtration or any normal chemical processes. Tritiated water is chemically identical to ordinary water. Municipal water treatment plants cannot remove tritium from drinking water. You can’t filter water from water.
(4) Evaporation of tritiated water will produce radioactive water vapour. Tritiated water vapour will condense to form radioactive dew drops, and can precipitate as radioactive raindrops or radioactive snowflakes. To contain tritiated water therefore it is important to prevent evaporation. Sealed drums or water tanks are suitable for the task.
At Fukushima Daiichi there are about 1.3 million tonnes of tritiated water stored in over 1000 large steel tanks. This inventory is constantly growing because of the continual cooling of the molten cores with ordinary water which becomes heavily contaminated with two dozen radioactive waste materials on contact with the molten core material, including tritium. The main reason that TEPCO has given for dumping this huge amount of stored tritiated water into the Pacific Ocean is simply because the site is running out of space to accommodate more tanks. This is a lame excuse – more space can be found if needed. The tritiated water at Fukushima is also contaminated with other radioactive materials, even though much of these other varieties has been greatly reduced by decontamination equipment called ALPS — which in no way reduces the tritium content. Since no removal process is 100%, other radionuclides remain in the tritiated water, in some cases to a very significant degree.
This problem of a growing inventory of tritiated water will not occur at Indian Point or any other shut down nuclear reactor. In such a situation, the volume of tritiated water is a constant and can be stored for many decades in drums. These drums would have to be inspected and repaired or replaced when necessary.
(5) All organic molecules (including DNA) incorporate carbon atoms and hydrogen atoms. Tritium atoms can and do replace some of the non-radioactive hydrogen atoms in the organic molecules in your body. This is called “organically bound tritium” or OBT. Whereas tritiated water, like ordinary water, passes through the body easily, OBT stays around for a lot longer. The “biological half-life” is how long it takes the body to get rid of half of the tritium; evidently it depends a lot on whether it is OBT or not. Tritium and carbon-14 are unique in their ability to become a part of our very own DNA molecules; most radionuclides do not have this possibility.
(6) It has been shown in animal experiments that tritium causes genetic damage of almost all kinds, both chromosomal and non-chromosomal. Tritium ingested by a pregnant female passes through the umbilical cord to the embryo and the developing fetus in fact gets a larger radiation dose than the mother. Tritium has been shown to cause physical deformities and more subtle developmental abnormalities in embryos of experimental animals – for example, loss of the “righting reflex” in mammalian juveniles.
(7) Tritium gives off a non-penetrating form of beta radiation and so it is relatively harmless outside the body – unless it is in contact with bare skin. It can be absorbed directly through the skin. However once inside the body it goes everywhere (all organs) and is known to be at least 2-3 times more biologically damaging (per unit of absorbed energy) than gamma radiation. IMPORTANT: Although this “discrepancy” has been known for decades, and is not disputed, NONE of the regulatory bodies take it into account! After careful study, the UK Committee Examining Radiation Risks of Internal Emitters (CERRIE) published a report showing that the biological damage of tritium (per unit of absorbed energy) may be as much as 15 times greater than the damage from gamma radiation. See www.ccnr.org/tritium_paper_CERRIE.pdf .
(1) Resources on tritium can be found at “Troubles with Tritium” www.ccnr.org/#tr For general background on tritium, this article is easy to read: http://www.ccnr.org/GE_ODWAC_2009_e.pdf(2) Other resources can be found at Tritium Awareness Project (TAP Canada) http://tapcanada.orgHere is a brief reference to OBT (organically-bound tritium) from TAP Canada.
Additional information on tritium .
Robert Alvarez, 9 Aug 23,
To augment Gordon Edward;s ‘s excellent overview about tritium here are some other basic facts.
As for tritium being “mildly radioactive,” as Gordon points out, this is not the case when taken in the body- as tritiated water-the most common form of exposure. The Defense Nuclear Facility Safety Board overseeing DOE nuclear sites informed the Secretary of Energy in June 2019 that “tritiated water vapor represents a significant risk to those exposed to it, as its dose consequence to an exposed individual is 15,000 to 20,000 times higher than that for an equivalent amount of tritium gas.”
With a specific activity of 9,619 curies per gram, tritium emits, as it decays, nearly 400 trillion energetic disintegrations per second. William H. McBride, Professor of radiation oncology at the UCLA Medical School, describes ionizing radiation disintegrations as “explosive packages of energy” that are “highly efficient at forming complex, potentially lethal DNA double strand breaks.”
Source: William MacBride, UCLA School of Medicine Vice Chair for Research in Radiation, Principal Investigator of UCLA’s Center for Medical Countermeasures Against Radiation — National Institutes of Health, Jan 27, 2014.
“No matter how it is taken into the body,” states a fact sheet, from the Energy Departments’ Argonne National Laboratory, “tritium is uniformly distributed through all biological fluids within one to two hours.” During that brief time, the DNFSB points out that “the combination of a rapid intake and a short biological half-life means a large fraction of the radiological dose is acutely delivered within hours to days…” McBride underscored this concern, stating that, “damage to DNA can occur within minutes to hours.”
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