Teach-in targets depleted uranium weapons manufacturing in Scranton

On Tuesday, April 22, the same day as Pennsylvania's presidential primary, there will be a teach-in about the depleted uranium weapons and ammunitions produced by General Dynamics in Scranton, 50 miles northeast of Hometown. The event is organized by We the People, a New Hampshire-based organization that promotes campaign finance reform, and the New York-based No DU Coalition of the Hudson Valley. The event will take place at noon at General Dynamics' Scranton headquarters, located at 135 Cedar Ave.

Invitees include presidential candidates John McCain, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Mike Gravel and Ralph Nader, along with senior executives from General Dynamics and the Pentagon. Confirmed speakers include Herbert Reed, an Iraq veteran contaminated by depleted uranium.

A byproduct of the uranium enrichment process, depleted uranium is a very high-density metal used to make anti-tank munitions and armor-plating for tanks. DU is chemically toxic as well as slightly radioactive, and its main exposure route is thought to be inhalation of dust formed when DU munitions hit targets. The British government has attributed health problems and birth defect claims from a 1991 Gulf War veteran to DU poisoning, and scientific studies have suggested a link between chronic DU exposure and leukemia as well as other genetic, reproductive and neurological problems.

To date, most of the opposition to DU weapons has focused on their impact on veterans and civilians in war zones. But what about DU's impact on the communities where the weapons are manufactured? Could the DU weapons facility in Scranton be a factor in the unusually high cancer rates in Northeastern Pennsylvania?

Listed in the Environmental Protection Agency's Toxics Release Inventory as the "U.S. Army Scranton Army Ammunition Plant," the facility in 2006 reported releasing to the environment 13 pounds of toxic chemicals -- the metals chromium, copper, manganese and nickel. However, uranium and depleted uranium are not included among the chemicals covered by the TRI.


(Photo of Iraqi baby believed to be have been deformed by depleted uranium contamination by Dr. Jenan Hassan courtesy of Mindfully.org. For more photos of babies believed to have been impacted by DU, click here -- but please be warned that these images are quite graphic and disturbing. For more about Dr. Hassan's work, click here.)

Setting the record straight on Three Mile Island

(The following letter is by Three Mile Island Alert Chairman Eric Epstein. It's of obvious interest to residents of the Hometown area, who live 80 miles downwind from the site of America's worst nuclear disaster, and who are also suffering from an unusually high rate of polycythemia vera, a rare blood cancer that's been linked to low-level radiation exposure. For a PDF version of the letter complete with footnotes, click on the title below.)

Three Mile Island Had Lasting Consequences
August 7, 2007
Fortune Magazine

Dear Editor:

I was deeply disappointed in David Whitford's casual dismissal of the impact the Three Mile Island (TMI) accident had on our community, i.e. Rethinking Three Mile Island. Without supplying any hard data, Mr. Whitford regurgitates the mantra of the nuclear renaissance: "But guess what? No one died at Three Mile Island. No one even got hurt. Hard evidence simply does not exist that any living thing, animal or vegetable, was significantly harmed by the small amount of radiation released during the accident. Even in the most extreme cases, the exposure was less than anyone living in the area receives from natural sources."

Perhaps Mr. Whitford was referring to the University of Pittsburgh (1) health study which was essentially a recitation of discredited protocol and disputed data. Rereleased on October 31, 2002, the study actually acknowledged an increase in lymphatic and blood cancers among men.

Also, as in previous health studies relating to TMI, this survey relied on government and nuclear industry sponsored health studies which were completed in the early 1980s. These studies were based on inaccurate dose projections, did not factor data regarding the severity and conditions of the core meltdown (2), and ignored prevailing weather conditions and wind patterns in March-April, 1979.

None of these studies evaluate the health impact to members of our community who defueled Three Mile Island. In fact, TMIs owners choose not to maintain a health or cancer registry despite the fact, that from 1979-1989, 5,000 cleanup workers received 'measurable doses' of radiation exposure. (3)

Moreover, the University of Pittsburgh's Study relied heavily on the much maligned Pennsylvania Department of Health's 22-year-old survey released in September, 1985. That Study's protocol was ridiculed and criticized by epidemiologists at Harvard and Penn State for diluting increases in cancer by expanding the population base to include people living outside of the ten-mile study-zone. (October 1985.) (4)

A great deal of radiation was released by the core melt at TMI. The President's Commission estimated about 15 million curies of radiation were released into the atmosphere. A review of dose assessments, conducted by Dr. Jan Beyea, (National Audubon Society; 1984) (5) estimated that from 276 to 63,000 person-rem were delivered to the general population within 50 miles of TMI. More recently, David Lochbaum of the Union of Concerned Scientists, estimated between 40 million curies and 100 million curies escaped during the accident.

The plant's owners, codefendants and insurers have paid over $84 million in health, economic and evacuation claims, including a $1.1 million settlement for a baby born with Down's Syndrome. (6) In June 2000, the United States Supreme Court remanded 1,990 unsettled health suits from the TMI-accident back to Federal Court. (GPU v. Abrams; Dolan v. GPU.) (7)

In August 1996, a study by the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill authored by Dr. Steven Wing reported that "...there were reports of erythema, hair loss, vomiting, and pet death near TMI at the time of the accident...Accident doses were positively associated with cancer incidence. Associations were largest for leukemia, intermediate for lung cancer, and smallest for all cancers combined...Inhaled radionuclide contamination could differentially impact lung cancers, which show a clear dose-related increase." (8)

Today, TMI-2 remains a high-level radioactive waste in the middle of the Susquehanna River. There was no decommissioning fund established for TMI at the time of the accident. (9) The site of the nations worst commercial nuclear accident has not been decontaminated nor decommissioned. There has not been a human entry in the basement of the reactor building since March, 1979.

TMI is an accident without an ending. Next time you drive through our community, stop for a while, and read the fine print on the nuclear label.

Sincerely,
Eric Joseph Epstein
4100 Hillsdale Road
Harrisburg, PA 17112
(717)-541-1101 Phone
ericepstein@comcast.net

Mr. Epstein is the Chairman of Three Mile Island Alert , Inc., tmia.com, a safe-energy organization based in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and founded in 1977. TMIA monitors Peach Bottom, Susquehanna, and Three Mile Island nuclear generating stations.

Elevated leukemia rates in children, youths found near nuclear reactors

This news comes as the PPL Corp. considers applying for a license to add a third reactor to its nuclear plant in Luzerne County. The federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry is already studying unusually high rates of polycythemia vera in Luzerne as well as neighboring Schuylkill and Carbon counties. Previous studies (PDF) have found an association between p. vera and radiation exposure. Besides PPL's Susquehanna nuclear plant, other sources of low-level radiation in the three-county area are the region's seven waste-coal-burning power plants.

Contact: Annette Whibley
wizard.media@virgin.net
Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Children and young people show elevated leukaemia rates near nuclear facilities

Review covers 136 countries in US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, Japan and Spain

Leukaemia rates in children and young people are elevated near nuclear facilities, but no clear explanation exists to explain the rise, according to a research review published in the July issue of European Journal of Cancer Care.

Researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina carried out a sophisticated meta-analysis of 17 research papers covering 136 nuclear sites in the UK, Canada, France, the USA, Germany, Japan and Spain.

They found that death rates for children up to the age of nine were elevated by between five and 24 per cent, depending on their proximity to nuclear facilities, and by two to 18 per cent in children and young people up to the age of 25.

Incidence rates were increased by 14 to 21 per cent in zero to nine year olds and seven to ten percent in zero to 25 year-olds.

"Childhood leukaemia is a rare disease and nuclear sites are commonly found in rural areas, which means that sample sizes tend to be small," says lead author Dr Peter J Baker.

"The advantage of carrying out a meta-analysis is that it enables us to draw together a number of studies that have employed common methods and draw wider conclusions."

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

But the authors point out that dose-response studies they looked at -- which describe how an organism is affected by different levels of exposure -- did not show excess rates near nuclear facilities.

"Several difficulties arise when conducting dose-response studies in an epidemiological setting as they rely on a wide range of factors that are often hard to quantify," explains Dr Baker. "It is also possible that there are environmental issues involved that we don't yet understand."

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

The research review looked at studies carried out between 1984 and 1999, focusing on research that provided statistics for individual sites on children and young people aged from zero to 25.

Four studies covered the UK, with a further three covering just Scotland. Three covered France, two looked at Canada and there was one study each from the USA, Japan, Spain, the former East Germany and the former West Germany.

"Although our meta-analysis found consistently elevated rates of leukaemia near nuclear facilities, it is important to note that there are still many questions to be answered, not least about why these rates increase," concludes Dr Baker.

"Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain the excess of childhood leukaemia in the vicinity of nuclear facilities, including environmental exposure and parental exposure. Professor Kinlen from Oxford University has also put forward a hypothesis that viral transmission, caused by mixing populations in a new rural location, could be responsible.

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

Reference: Meta-analysis of standardized incidence and mortality rates of childhood leukaemia in proximity to nuclear facilities. Baker PJ and Hoel D. European Journal of Cancer Care. 16, pages 355-363. July 2007.

Remembering Three Mile Island

Today marks the 28th anniversary of the disaster at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Harrisburg, Pa. To mark the anniversary of that event -- which I suspect may have played a role in the cancer death of my father, who was one of the workers who helped repair the plant, as well as the cancer epidemic afflicting the downwind Hometown area -- I share with you three accounts by whistleblowers of the ensuing cover-up by authorities.

* * *

The first is a letter by nuclear whistleblower Paul Blanch to Dr. Rosalie Bertell, an epidemiologist and expert in the health affects of low-level radiation. You can find a copy of the letter online here.

Dr. Bertell:

You don't know me but may have read about me in the Time magazine cover story in February 1996 and also the front page of the Wall Street Journal in March 1998. I am a prominent whistleblower who uncovered major corruption within the NRC and my employer Northeast Utilities. As a result of events I uncovered at Millstone, Northeast Utilities was almost bankrupted, and the NRC extremely embarrassed.

I was one of the expert witnesses at the TMI litigation and agree with you there was a major cover-up of vital information. The presidential commissions, the NRC and the DOE are all aware of this cover-up. As an expert witness, I had access to the all the original records. I have documented evidence, which I have given to the NRC, that the primary containment was breached shortly after the hydrogen explosion that occurred on March 30, 1979.

This breach occurred at a time when the radioactivity in the containment was close to its peak. Preliminary estimates indicate that as many as 40 million curies may have been released during the following hours. The NRC and the licensee estimated the maximum of 10 million curies of releases.

Not one of the studies ever even questioned the data that was readily available as it could have alarmed members of the general public. Contact me if you have any questions.

Paul M. Blanch
135 Hyde Rd.
West Hartford, CT 06117

* * *

The following statement was made by Jane Rickover, daughter-in-law of Admiral Hyman Rickover, who was known as the "Father of the Nuclear Navy." It was notorized by William Lamson on July 18, 1986. Jane Rickover has verified the authenticity of the document and the events described in it. You can find it online here.

In May, 1983, my father-in-law, Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, told me that at the time of the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor accident, a full report was commissioned by President Jimmy Carter. He [my father-in-law] said that the report, if published in its entirety, would have destroyed the civilian nuclear power industry because the accident at Three Mile Island was infinitely more dangerous than was ever made public. he told me that he had used his enormous personal influence with President Carter to persuade him to publish the report only in a highly "diluted" form. The President himself had originally wished the full report to be made public.

In November, 1985, my father-in-law told me that he had come to deeply regret his action in persuading President Carter to suppress the most alarming aspects of that report.


[Signed] Jane Rickover

Jane Rickover appeared before me and swore as to the truth of the
above statement.

Dated at Toronto this 18th day of July A.D. 1986

[Signed] William F. Lamson

William F. Lamson Q.C.
Notary Public for the Province of Ontario

* * *

Finally, here is a copy of Bertell's own signed, notarized statement from 1998 on the TMI disaster. It is online here.

I feel that former President Jimmy Carter should come forth with all of the facts surrounding the Three Mile Island Accident, especially those which involved the radiation release and the dose to the public.

This disclosure should, moreover, be in language which can be easily and correctly understood by the public, and not massaged to hide the truth. After the accident, for example, I found that the dose officially assigned to the public, was called: "measured dose to the public from the accident" - where "measured" meant it only included the dose after the rate matres were in place the third day after the accident began; "accident" meant that the radiation dose received during the same time period in 1978 when the TMI reactors were all operating and there was Chinese nuclear test fallout, could be subtracted.

President Carter was, and continues to be by his silence, complicit in keeping the true facts of the Three Mile Island Accident from the American and world public. While it may have been legally although not morally, permissible to withhold this information in 1979 under the guise of national security needs, now that the Cold War is over it is no longer credible that the US government protect the nuclear industry at the cost of the lives and health of its citizens.

As I, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health, stated in my e-mail to President Carter of February 10,1998, President carter was and is involved in the cover up of the Three Mile island Accident, and in particular the serious health damage to the people who lived nearby. I was on the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Blue Ribbon Panel set up by President Carter to investigate the TMI accident. The members of this public panel did not have FBI clearance, with the possible exception of Dr. Kemmeny who had worked on the Manhattan Project. The staff, selected from those who worked for the NRC or DOE, did have such security clearance, and therefore they were able to withhold any information they or their superiors wanted to declare "classified", from the Panel. The nuclear weapons program demanded that workers and the military personnel handle this radioactive material and the nuclear ordinance, therefore health effects of radiation could be classified for national security to prevent rebellion.

At the first meeting of the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission, I brought up this potential problem and asked what provisions had been made for the Commission members to have security clearance so that they might have full access to the truth about the accident. Another Advisory Council Member asked who was in charge of reactor operations during the accident. These two questions were never answered, and they were enough to cause the dissolution of the entire advisory panel. In fact, Dr. Kemmeny even stated publicly to the press that we had never been invited to Washington [although the Commission paid our air fare and hotel bills]. The Industry Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission continued to function during the investigation.

The nuclear industry has frustrated the litigation of all of the serious health claims of the TMI exposed people, in spite of the Supreme Court's ruling in 1997 that these claims must be heard. Lawyers for the nuclear industry are gloating that they are "invincible" before the Courts. Using dirty tactics, they have managed to eliminate all of the expert witnesses which the victims had engaged to bring their cause before the Court, subsequently causing the cases to be dismissed for lack of witnesses. There may be as many as 2,000 people who have not had their grievances heard by the courts. This dismissal, after the Supreme Court Ruling, as accomplished through a judge's ruling, not through the court hearing which the people had been promised. The people have still, almost 20 years after the accident, not had their day in court!

It is my opinion that former President Carter should come forth and make the truth known so that the court cases for the victims can be reopened. I believe that it should also be made a court ruling that defendants, such as the nuclear industry, should not be allowed to declare their own witnesses the official spokespersons for a branch of knowledge, able to define for the court the methodologies which they accept and practice as the only legitimate ones! It was such a ploy that was used to dismiss the TMI plaintiff's witnesses. This is blatant violation of justice and of the human rights of the victims. It is especially abhorrent in the questions of health effects of radiation, a field of public health which was usurped by the nuclear physicists under the exigencies of potential nuclear war after World War II. Professional Health Physicists are not required to have any training in biology, public health or any medical discipline. Their methodologies are very limited and unacceptable to many professionals in the fields of epidemiology, occupational and public health.

[Signed] Dr. Rosalie Bertell

Notarized by Michele D. Guy, July 10, 1998