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Article Published in Open Journal of Pediatrics

Janette Sherman, Joseph Mangano and Christopher Busby have published an article in the Open Journal of Pediatrics about the link between radiation exposure and thyroid disease.

Radiation exposure has been linked to increased risk of congenital hypothyroidism (CH) for decades. CH is a relatively uncommon condition, occurring in about 1 of 2000 US births. Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH) levels for each child born in California permitted an analysis of combined confirmed and borderline CH cases. Borderline/confirmed CH cases are more than seven times greater than just confirmed cases. Airborne levels of gross beta nuclear radiation in the US were elevated in the period starting several days after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, especially in west coast states like California. The borderline/confirmed CH rate for newborns during the last 9.5 months in 2011 (exposed to Fukushima in utero) vs. births during other periods in 2011 and 2012 (not exposed) was significantly elevated, suggesting that adverse health effects to the newborn thyroid were not restricted to just a small number of confirmed CH cases. The sensitivity of the fetus to radiation exposure, plus the presence of thyroid-seeking radioiodine, suggest further analysis of Fukushima’s potential to cause adverse health effects in newborns is needed.

To read the full article, OJPed_2013112811114610

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Fukushima Fallout Damaged the Thyroids of California Babies

A Global Threat
Fukushima Fallout Damaged the Thyroids of California Babies
by Chris Busby

A new study of the effects of tiny quantities of radioactive fallout from Fukushima on the health of babies born in California shows a significant excess of hypothyroidism caused by the radioactive contamination travelling 5,000 miles across the Pacific. The article will be published next week in the peer-reviewed journal Open Journal of Pediatrics.

Congenital hypothyroidism is a rare but serious condition normally affecting about one child in 2,000, and one that demands clinical intervention – the growth of children suffering from the condition is affected if they are left untreated. All babies born in California are monitored at birth for Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH) levels in blood, since high levels indicate hypothyroidism.

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The Cost of Nuclear Power: Contrasting Views in the New York Times

Joseph Mangano, Executive Director of the Radiation and Public Health Project, and Edward L. Quinn, Past President of the American Nuclear Society, have written contrasting opinion pieces in response to an article by Eduardo Porter entitled “Coming Full Circle in Energy, to Nuclear”,  published in the New York Times, August 21, 2013.

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As the World Turns: The Fantasy World of Nuclear Power

Dr. Sherman writes for counterpunch.com, Weekend Edition Aug 30-Sep 01, 2013

No, not that one, the soap opera that ran from 1956 to 2010, but our world that turns. As we look at a weather map on TV or in our paper, we see clouds, rain, snow, and storms coming from west to east. What is in the air above the earth precipitates as our earth revolves underneath what is in that air. To demonstrate this, look at a globe of the world and realize that what the weather is in Chicago today will be the weather on the east coast tomorrow.

With this concept in mind we understand that releases from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant that began on March 11, 2011 crosses the Pacific Ocean and reaches land throughout the northern hemisphere, and contaminates all life that dwells upon the land and in the waters. As was documented after the Chernobyl catastrophe, fallout is not uniform, but varies by wind direction, elevation and temperature.

The current revelations from Fukushima portend dire consequences for all life. Some scientists have expressed concern about a possible “China Syndrome” — named after the 1979 film starring Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon and Michael Douglas, that was released the same year as the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant in Pennsylvania experienced a partial meltdown.

Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO,) the owner of the Fukushima plant, has been pouring millions of gallons of water onto the reactor cores and spent fuel rod pools to keep them from overheating. This has resulted in TEPCO trying to store some 400 tons of contaminated water each day, some of it so highly contaminated that workers cannot get close enough to find the leaks. Given that water runs downhill, the contamination is leaking past barriers and into the Pacific Ocean. As of August 21, 2013, markedly increased levels of radioactive tritium, cesium and strontium are reported.

Isotopes are taken up by sea life, including plants, single-cell organisms, algae, seaweed, crabs, oysters, fish, mammals and other sea creatures. A resolution from the American Medical Association called for the FDA to measure radioactivity levels in edible commercial Pacific Ocean fish sold in the U. S. To date the FDA has not responded to the request, so we do not know if testing has been done, and if done, if any data are available for the public. This is not unlike events immediately after the Fukushima meltdown when the EPA released data on elevated levels of radioactive iodine (I-131) along the west coast, and then in May, reverted to “quarterly measurements.”

Currently, US “guidelines” allow for food levels of 1200 Becquerel’s per kilogram, one of the highest in the world. Japan’s limit is 100, so food too contaminated to sell in Japan could be sold here in the U.S.

According to recent news, the U. S. government is collecting data on our phone and e-mail transactions. If this is a worthwhile use of citizen’s taxes, then collecting data on radiation levels in food, a significant health risk, should be worthwhile also. Sick children and adults are a burden on our economy and society as a whole. Preventing exposure to food contaminated with radioactive isotopes is primary preventive health.

What is happening as a result of the Fukushima meltdown and subsequent inability to control the releases may not be all that different from soap opera events. Similarly, As the World Turns, aired on CBS, we are living in a fantasy world if we think that nuclear power is “safe.”

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Al Jazeera America Presents: Into Eternity, A New Documentary

Every day, the world over, large amounts of high-level radioactive waste created by nuclear power plants is placed in interim storage facilities, which are vulnerable to natural disasters, man-made disasters, and to societal changes. In Finland, the world’s first permanent repository is being hewn out of solid rock that must last 100,000 years, as this is how long the waste remains hazardous.

This new documentary premieres Sunday, August 25, 2013, 9:00 EST / 6:00 PST. See america.aljazeera.com for details.

Al Jazeera America Presents brings viewers feature documentaries and original series from acclaimed filmmakers around the globe. Introducing compelling, seldom-heard voices and provocative viewpoints, this strand showcases important stories that entertain, enlighten and inspire.

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Nuclear Meltdown—The Need For Timely & Honest Information

Of particular interest in the United States is the operation of the Indian Point Nuclear Reactor located on the Hudson River 25 miles north of New York City (NYC), the most heavily populated metropolitan area in the United States. A comprehensive study conducted – at the request of the State of New York – in 2003 by James Lee Witt Associates outlined the many risks posed to NYC residents by the Indian Point plant.

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Dr. Sherman Interviwed on CCTV America

Anchor Anand Naidoo asks radiation expert Dr. Janette Sherman why the leakage is still going on at Fukushima — and if it will imperil other countries.
View the video

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Dr. Sherman Quoted in National Geographic Article About Fukushima

Patrick J. Kiger
National Geographic News
Published August 7, 2013

“Tensions are rising in Japan over radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean from Japan’s crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a breach that has defied the plant operator’s effort to gain control.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Wednesday called the matter “an urgent issue” and ordered the government to step in and help in the clean-up, following an admission by Tokyo Electric Power Company that water is seeping past an underground barrier it attempted to create in the soil. The head of a Nuclear Regulatory Authority task force told Reuters the situation was an ’emergency.’. . .

“But most experts seem to think that ordinary movement of groundwater probably is the real culprit. An estimated 400 tons (95,860 gallons/ 362,870 liters) of water streams into the basements of the damaged reactors each day. Keeping that water from continuing to flow into the ocean is crucial. As the IAEA noted in its report, ‘the accumulation of enormous amounts of liquids due to the continuous intrusion of underground water into the reactor and turbine buildings is influencing the stability of the situation.’

‘Big surprise—water does flow downhill,’ said Dr. Janette Sherman, a medical expert on radiation and toxic exposure who once worked as a chemist for the Atomic Energy Commission, the forerunner of today’s U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. ‘If you’ve ever had a leak in your house during a storm, you know how hard it is to contain water. There’s a lot of water going into the plant, and it’s got to go someplace. It’s very hard to stop this.’”

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Radioactive Fish, Pacific Ocean, Fukushima Leaking MORE Radiation Video Update

Kevin Kamps, of the nuclear watchdog organization Beyond Nuclear, is interviewed by Thom Hartmann regarding the continued flow of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean around the Fukushima reactors. Additional news reports about radioactive fish and cancer.

Watch now.

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Aspects of DNA Damage from Internal Radionuclides

By Christopher Busby, Jacobs University, Bremen, Germany

Christopher Busby (2013). Aspects of DNA Damage from Internal Radionuclides, New Research Directions in DNA Repair, Prof. Clark Chen (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-51-1114-6, InTech, DOI: 10.5772/53942. Available from: http://www.intechopen.com/books/new-research-directions-in-dna-repair/aspects-of-dna-damage-from-internal-radionuclides

1. Introduction

“In this chapter, there is insufficient space to exhaustively review the research which has been carried out on internal radionuclide effects. I hope only to highlight evidence which shows that internal radionuclides cannot be assessed by the current radiation risk model, and to suggest some research directions that may enable a new model to be developed, one which more accurately quantifies the real effects of such exposures. The biological effects of exposure to ionizing radiation have been studied extensively in the last 70 years and yet very little effort has gone into examining the health effects of exposure to internal incorporated radionuclides. This is curious, since the biosphere has been increasingly contaminated with novel man-made radioactive versions of naturally occurring elements which living creatures have adapted to over evolutionary timescales, and intuition might suggest that these substances could represent a significant hazard to health, one not easily or accurately modelled by analogy with external photon radiation (X-rays and gamma rays).

The question of the health effects of internal radionuclide exposures began to be asked in the early 1950s when there was widespread fallout contamination of food and milk from atmospheric nuclear tests. It quickly became the subject of disagreements between two committees of the newly formed International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP)[1]. The questions of the equivalence of internal and external radiation exposure, which were the basis of these disagreements, have still not been resolved. In the West, up to very recently, the whole spectrum of health effects from internal incorporated radionuclides has focused on animal studies of Radium, Plutonium and Strontium-90 and human retrospective studies of those individuals exposed to Radium-226 and Thorium-232 in the contrast medium “Thorotrast”. These studies suffer from a number of problems which will be discussed.”

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