r.
Ursula Franklin initiated measuring radiation in baby teeth in the
1960's. The research done then determined Strontium-90 (Sr-90) levels
in baby teeth had risen 50 times the national average. Scientists
believed that this was due to regular above ground atomic bomb
testing. These initial findings are said to have influenced the
successful push for a nuclear test ban.
(photo: Children riding bicycles past Pickering
Nuclear Generating Station, Ontario)
Today, the Radiation and Public Health Project
continues the testing of baby teeth under the auspices of the Tooth
Fairy Study. They send their teeth to a lab in Ontario. Their latest
study found that the amount of Sr-90 rose 37% from the mid-1980s to
the mid-1990s in southeast Florida baby teeth. Children diagnosed with
cancer had twice the Sr-90 as other children. The drinking water in
the vicinity of two nuclear power plants near Miami and West Palm
Beach was the most significant source of Sr-90. The report was
co-authored by Dr. Earnest Sternglass from the University of
Pittsburgh Medical School and Dr. Jerry Brown from Florida
International University in Miami. Dr. Brown issued a press release in
which he noted that "the recent 2003 recommendations of the
European Committee on Radiation Risk found that the world-wide health
effects of very low levels of radioactivity have been vastly
underestimated."
Read
the press release
A prior study looked at 3500 baby teeth from five different U.S.
states and everywhere the findings were troubling. They found that, on
average, Sr-90 concentration had risen fifty percent from children
born in the late 1980's to those born in the late 1990's. They found
that the highest average levels of Sr-90 were in counties close to
nuclear plants. They also found higher breast cancer rates in the same
areas. (www.radiation.org/nuclink.html)
These results were reported in Ottawa at the World Conference on
Breast Cancer in 2000. The Radiation and Public Health Project is a
non-profit group of scientists and health professionals dedicated to
researching the risks to human health from exposure to atomic bomb
test fallout and nuclear plant emissions. (www.radiation.org)
Sr-90 is listed on the National Research Council of Canada's (NRC)
website as a radioactive element "released in nuclear
explosions". There is no mention of nuclear power plants as a
source for Sr-90. According to the NRC website, Sr-90 "poses a
serious health hazard to humans. It can accumulate in the skeletal
system since the body does a poor job of distinguishing between Sr-90
and calcium. Thus, radiation emitted from radioactive Sr-90 can
interfere with the formation of new blood cells, with severe health
consequences."
Doctor Janet Sherman of the Tooth Fairy Project explains on the
Radiation and Public Health Project website that children are
vulnerable to Sr-90 in ways that adults are not. Babies in-utero get
Sr-90 from their mothers, who consume it through the food chain.
Babies knit Sr-90 into growing bones and teeth when their bodies
mistake it for calcium. This information matches with the National
Research Council of Canada's information; however, it is farfetched to
think that nuclear explosions could account for the dramatic increases
in Sr-90 levels over the last decade that the Tooth Fairy Project has
reported. More likely, this recent increase of Sr-90 levels in baby
teeth is due to releases from nuclear power plants.
It is unclear what the acceptable levels of Sr-90 are in Canada.
According to Health Canada's website, the maximum acceptable
concentration of Sr-90 is 5 bq/litre. However, click
over to Environment Canada's site and the Sr-90 acceptable limit
is listed at 10 bq/litre as acceptable for water quality in some
areas. Health Canada has been measuring Cesium (Cs-137) and
Sr-90 in milk and drinking water since the middle of the 1900's but
dramatically scaled back their testing in 1994. Doctor Murray Stewart,
Past President and C.E.O. of the Canadian Nuclear Association said in
an article by Michael Downey in 1999 that radiation released from
Canadian nuclear plants is "infinitesimally small." He said,
"Studies have never shown any link between commercial reactors or
commercial uranium to any incidence of cancer." However, Tom
Adams from Energy Probe referred me to a U.K. working paper in Bellona
#5:2001 that disputes this. According
to the British paper, studies have shown that the chance of
developing leukemia is greater for the population living close to
Sellafield Nuclear Plant than for the rest of the population in the
United Kingdom.
Norman Rubin is the Senior Consultant from Borealis Energy Research
Association and Director of Nuclear Research and Senior Policy Analyst
for Energy Probe.
He published a study that found that the higher rates of childhood
leukemia mortality around the Pickering and Bruce Nuclear Generating
Stations is "statistically significant" at the 19 times out
of 20 (p<05) level. According to Norman Rubin, this study was
reviewed by two AECB (Atomic Energy Canada Board?) experts, one of
whom "basically endorsed" his findings. He said that the
AECB still decided that the leukemia excess was "most likely due
to chance" and did no appropriate follow-up. Another study in
1991 by David McArthur, a former Canadian Nuclear Association
researcher, found that approximately 33% of birth defects in Pickering
may be caused by the Pickering Candu nuclear plant. "The
radioactive isotopes tritium and carbon-14 are most likely the cause
of at least seven types of (birth) defects. CANDU reactors routinely
release large amounts of both isotopes--more than other reactor
types--and the Pickering station has exceeded its short-term radiation
release guidelines. Both isotopes accumulate in locally grown food, a
major pathway to reproductive damage. The isotopes accumulate in
chromosomes, increasing damage to genetic material during atomic decay
and…inevitably cause genetic damage in Pickering residents." (http://www.antenna.nl/wise/361/3568.html)
That brings us to a study by Joe Mangano from the Tooth Fairy
Project, published in the Environmental Epidemeology and Toxicology
journal in 2000, which researched the occurrence of childhood cancer
around 12 closed down nuclear reactors. Results of the study showed
that there was a 35-50 percent decrease in childhood cancer in those
regions following the shutdown of the reactors. So what are we to
believe? Where should we live? Personally, living less than fifty
miles from the Point Lepreau nuclear plant, I wonder if my children
are safe enough. With the exception of Energy Probe, Canadian studies
on the levels of radiation in people living near nuclear power plants
are non-existent.
With the strong possibility of the refurbishment of Point Lepreau
going ahead without any Environmental Impact Assessment, we won't be
getting such studies any time soon. It is up to the citizens to demand
that these studies be done to conclude one way or another if all of us
are suffering and dying unnecessarily for the greater good…or greed.
