Dear Readers:
Drink to your health!
In the 1950s and '60s, people used to say: "Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we may be radioactive!" when they worried about "The Bomb". Or rather, when they didn't.
Well, here we go again. The Slow Bomb. A slow death for the reactors. Ten years or more.
How fitting. Radiation's effects are usually a slow death for us, too. Ten years or more.
Below is a letter about WHAT to eat and drink, from Dr. Rosalie Bertell, perhaps the most eminent scientist alive (or left, or perhaps ever) on the study of the damage to human health from radiation, and the author of the books "No Immediate Danger: Prognosis for a Radioactive Earth" (1985) and "Planet Earth: The Latest Weapon of War" (2005), as well as hundreds of articles, poems, chapters, etc.. Dr. Bertell, Grey Nun of the Sacred Heart, received her Ph. D. degree in Biometrics with minors in Biology and Biochemistry from the Catholic University of America, in 1966.
Here is a very brief biographical sketch of Dr. Bertell:
http://iicph.org/bio_rosalie_bertell
We are honored by, and thank Dr. Bertell for, her contribution to this newsletter.
Ace Hoffman Carlsbad, CA
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Today's items:
(1) Letter from Dr. Rosalie Bertell regarding protection from radiation (2) Press Release: Web site where USDA-grade KI can be purchased (3) Janette Sherman: Will Fukushima Be Worse Than Chernobyl? (from CounterPunch) (4) Ace interview on the Internet by Alex Smith, Radio Ecoshock (5) How the URL got messed up last time (excuses, excuses...) by Ace Hoffman (6) Contact information for the author of this newsletter
---------------------------------------------------------- (1) Letter from Dr. Rosalie Bertell: ----------------------------------------------------------
From: "Rosalie Bertell, GNSH" <rosaliebertell@greynun.org>
Subject: RE: Sayonara...
Dear Ace, I am telling people to use distilled water. It can leach out the radioactive heavy metals from cooked products. Fruits can be soaked in it. If there is some internal contamination it is safe to drink even for a pregnant woman. Do not reuse the cooking water but throw it on the ground where no food is raised. Internally keep up hydration so that the nuclear debris does not go back into storage in the bone. See enclosure! Rosalie Bertell
-------------------------- Enclosure: --------------------------
Dear Friends and Residents of this interdependent global home, I cannot give magical answers to everyone's needs at this time of crisis with the Japanese nuclear disaster. However, I can give you a few tips on how to listen to the official "expert" statements given on CNN or NHK or other networks, plus some tips on what to eat or not eat. LISTENING First, there is a great difference between medical use of radiation, with direct risk and benefit to a patient and the random distribution of a comparable dose to a large population. In the latter case the risk is magnified by the size of the population and the benefit goes to filling some general society benefit. Hence the individual harm may be sacrificed for the military or economic good of a country. How or why we must make this trade off has never been well understood by the public or well explained and agreed to by reasonable civil society. There is also a significant difference between internal contamination with radioactive debris from a nuclear disaster and direct irradiation from an external medical devise under the control of a professional who can ask for your consent, limit the exposure and take care of any problems which might unwittingly immediately occur. Medical radiologists keep no record of the long term results. When internal radioactive tracers are used in medicine they have short half lives (both biologically and physically) and are not similar to plutonium, uranium or thorium or other debris found in nuclear disasters. Nevertheless, both exposures can be significant, and require some consent by those at risk. Unfortunately, this prior consent is absent in a disaster! EATING AND DRINKING Persons with good general health and good basic nutritional health will fare better when the food, air or water is contaminated since the body normally chooses uncontaminated food when it is available to it. Avoid eating salads if you are suspicious of it being contaminated by fallout or contaminated water, and always wash carefully fruits and vegetables to remove any surface contamination. Do not take Potassium Iodide without medical supervision. The iodine 131 has a short half life, and probably will not travel very far from the source unless the release from the reactor is explosive, sending the debris high into the atmosphere. If there is radioactive iodine in milk then there probably also is cobalt 60, a very dangerous gamma radiation emitter. The inorganic cobalt is incorporated into organic vitamin B 12 in the udder of the cow and becomes much more dangerous especially to the liver when ingested in milk. Avoid fresh milk for the children, unfortunately! Be careful to get sufficient rest so that the body can undertake efficient repair of any damage. Keep hydrated with the best water available to you! Although it is true that alpha radiation, the primary radiation in early fallout, can be stopped by paper, when this same radioactivity is released inside the body it does at least 20 times the cellular damage as the equivalent dose of X-ray. This would be contact dose, the highest dose a radioactive atom can give. If you have distilled water available, or are able to prepare your own, use it for cooking vegetables that are from contaminated areas. This is clearly true in Japan, but also in the US since our bread basket is in California! It will leach out heavy metal debris. Throw out the waste water! You could also soak fruit in distilled water for the same reason. This is safe even for a pregnant woman and her fetus. If you live in or near to the contamination, use distilled water also for drinking. You can do this safely for up to two years. This was the only thing mentioned as helpful by the atomic veterans, that were deliberately exposed to nuclear radiation after WW II to see if they could function in a nuclear war. I like to hold the food in my hands and thank it for its goodness. Then I ask that it protect me from any harmful contaminants it holds. I think this a sort of modern Prayer before Meals, and not irrelevant under the circumstances. I wish you well, and especially hold in prayer the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and all the other radiation victims/survivors of our world, for they are terrified by this massive threat which they hoped no one would ever have to suffer again! Peace! Rosalie Bertell
---------------------------------------------------------- (2) KI: Press release about a new online availability: ----------------------------------------------------------
First (below, top) is my response to their press release, and then (below, bottom) is their press release. My gut reaction is: Definitely a company I would do business with (although I still have lots of KI from Y2K (remember Y2K?))! -- Ace
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April 14th, 2011
Dear samandy.com,
Thank you for sending me this, it's wonderfully written and I will include it in today's newsletter, which is about what people can do to protect themselves.
Regarding your press release, I do think KI's been recommended a lot longer than 10 years, though. Since Chernobyl at least. But the government's never been very good about passing it out and informing people about it.
We assume it's being passed out around Fukushima but it quite possibly was done too late, since the largest iodine bursts came early (we think, and not to say they aren't on-going...) and once the body takes up the radioactive Iodine, it's too late, and the KI is of much more limited value (which is NOT to say one should give up and don't take it if you have to start later!).
But it is to say that individuals and families really have to have it on-hand if they live near a reactor and even then, the officials never tell you when there's been a major release until it's too late! Regulators and plant owners need to admit it when it happens, so people can IMMEDIATELY take the KI -- and get out of Dodge!
Thank you again,
Sincerely,
Ace Hoffman Carlsbad, CA
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At 10:32 AM 4/14/2011 -0500, Sam Andy wrote:
Sam Andy
Contact: J. R. Sauer FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Telephone: (719) 269-3030 Or 1-888-331-0358 Email: jrsy2k@earthlink.net
Sam Andy Offers Protection Against Radiation
Potassium Iodide Added to Inventory of Survival Supplies and Storage Foods
A provider of long-term storage foods for over half a century, Sam Andyâ Foods, located in Canon City, CO has added vital protection, a 14-day supply of FDA approved, potassium iodide, as of April 11, 2011, to citizens in the event of a nuclear catastrophe such as the recent disaster in Japan. The firm's CEO, J.R. Sauer, says "The decision to make this inexpensive product readily available was prompted by "runs" on pharmacies or health food shops and long waiting lists for customers throughout the West Coast earlier this month" when it became apparent that radiation or wind-blown radioactive iodine from Fukashima had reached the U.S. from California to Washington state. Potassium iodide has been recommended by public health authorities as a protective measure against the uptake of radioactive iodine by the thyroid gland, potentially leading to cancer or other illness, for over ten years.
However, in view of the slow response of the government to Katrina and other civil defense measures, many people feel safer providing for their own immediate families. With five aging (30-39 years) U.S. nuclear reactors on or close to identified earthquake faults, protective steps need to be considered. There are four nuclear reactor sites along the West Coast one nuclear reactor site in Washington, two in California and one in Arizona and several more close to the New Madrid fault in the center of the country. (from: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/energy/blogs/nuclear-power-and-earthquake-zones-overlap-in-the-us)
Potassium iodide blocks the uptake of radioactive iodine. Growing children are especially vulnerable to this danger. As this product has a long and stable "shelf-life", it is recommended that individuals living within 10 to 50 miles of a nuclear reactor or research facility have a 14-day supply on hand in case of a failure or accident. For more information, including research data, readers are urged to contact Sam Andy, toll-free, at 1-888-331-0358 or visit our website at: www.samandy.com. We are glad to discuss this product, the need for it and how to use it. ###
TO IGNORE THE FACTS DOES NOT CHANGE THE FACTS. -- Anonymous
"EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED TO EVERYTHING ELSE -- and we really ARE 'all one' (as in one big family) so what gores Japan's ox gores the rest of us, eventually." -- Avalon Bruce, M.P.H.
---------------------------------------------------------- (3) Janette Sherman: Will Fukushima Be Worse Than Chernobyl? (from CounterPunch): ----------------------------------------------------------
This originally appeared in Counterpunch in late March, but is well worth reading: http://www.counterpunch.org/sherman03242011.html
The Public Has a Right to Know
Will Fukushima Be Worse Than Chernobyl?
By Dr. JANETTE SHERMAN, MD
A little over six months ago I wrote: " Given profound weather effects (earthquakes, floods, tsunamis, etc.), human fallibility, and military conflicts, many believe that it only a matter of time before there is another nuclear catastrophe. Nuclear fallout knows no state or national boundaries, and will contribute to increase in illnesses, decrease in intelligence, and instability throughout the world. The economic costs of radioactive pollution and care of contaminated citizens are staggering. No country can maintain itself if its' citizens are economically, intellectually, politically, and socially impoverished." [My submission was rejected… too alarmist? ]
While 25 years separates the sites and the events that led to the catastrophes at Fukushima and Chernobyl, the effects will be very similar and will remain so for years to decades to centuries.
After Chernobyl, there was a delay in collecting and releasing information. The nuclear industry and many governments are reluctant to alarm the public, but the public has a right to know what the risks are and if possible to avoid as much as possible those risks.
The science of radiobiology is not new. When we know the identity of a radioisotope, we can predict how it will interact with living matter human, animal or plant. Decades of research have confirmed that radioisotopes become deposited in various parts of living systems.
In humans, I-131 and I-129 concentrate in the thyroid, Cs-137 in soft tissue, and Sr-90 in teeth and bones.
Key to understanding effects is the difference between external and internal radiation. While external radiation, as from x-rays, neutron, gamma and cosmic rays can harm and kill, internal radiation (alpha and beta particles) when absorbed by ingestion and inhalation, releases damaging energy in direct contact with tissues and cells.
There is serious concern for the workers at the Fukushima plant, because of their proximity to the disabled reactors and to the fuel rods that have lost their protective cover of water. Some of the Fukushima workers, as with the "liquidators" at Chernobyl are exposed to dangerous levels of gamma and neutron radiation.
Those not in close proximity to the those sources of radiation will be spared some of the intense exposure, but will not escape the exposure from radionuclides that emit alpha and beta particles, as well as gamma radiation. These enter the bodies of humans by inhalation and ingestion of food and water.
Of the Chernobyl "liquidators" the young and healthy men and women who worked to stop the fires and to contain the release of radioactivity from Chernobyl, by 2005, some 125,000 of the estimated total of 830,000 were dead (15%) mostly from circulatory, blood diseases and malignancies.
Children born to liquidator families were seriously affected with birth defects and thyroid diseases, including cancer, and loss of intellect. But other children, based upon the research of multiple researchers, it is estimated that in the heavily contaminated areas of Belarus only 20% of children are considered healthy, placing an enormous burden upon governmental resources to provide medical care and education for those affected.
Many pro-nuclear critics have downplayed the risks from Chernobyl attributing concerns to "radio-phobia" but documentation of disease is not limited to the human population. With few exceptions, animal and plant systems that were studied demonstrated structural abnormalities in offspring, loss of tolerance and viability, and genetic changes. Wild animals and plants did not drink alcohol, smoke or worry about compensation.
When a radiation release occurs we do not know in advance the part of the biosphere it will contaminate, the animals, plants, and people that will be affected, nor the amount or duration of harm. In many cases, damage is random, depending upon the health, age, and status of development and the amount, kind, and variety of radioactive contamination that reaches humans, animals and plants.
For this reason, open and transparent data must be collected and maintained for all biological systems human, animal, plant. We must have international support of research on the consequences of the Fukushima and support of Chernobyl research must continue in order to mitigate the ongoing and increasing damage. Access to information must be transparent and open to all, across all borders. The WHO must severe its' cooperation with the IAEA, in place since 1959, and assume independent responsibility in support of international health.
Given the emerging problems from the Fukushima nuclear plants and the continuing and known problems caused by the Chernobyl catastrophe, we must ask ourselves: before we commit ourselves to economic and technologic support of nuclear energy, who, what and where are we willing to sacrifice and for how long?
Janette D. Sherman, M. D. is the author of Life's Delicate Balance: Causes and Prevention of Breast Cancer and Chemical Exposure and Disease
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1560328703/counterpunchmaga
and is a specialist in internal medicine and toxicology. She edited the book Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and Nature
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1573317578/counterpunchmaga
written by A. V. Yablokov, V. B., Nesterenko and A. V. Nesterenko, published by the New York Academy of Sciences in 2009. Her primary interest is the prevention of illness through public education. She can be reached at: toxdoc.js@verizon.net and www.janettesherman.com
This originally appeared in Counterpunch: http://www.counterpunch.org/sherman03242011.html
###
---------------------------------------------------------- (4) Ace interview on the Internet by Alex Smith, Radio Ecoshock: ----------------------------------------------------------
I plan to create a You-Tube video with the audio track and post it on You-Tube, but in the meantime, I've posted Alex Smith's mp3 audio track at my web site here:
http://www.acehoffman.org/audio/ecoshock/ES_Ace_Hoffman.mp3
-----------------------------------
At 05:25 PM 4/13/2011 -0700, Alex Smith wrote:
Hi Ace
You should have received via yousendit.com a download mp3 of our chat.
You have my permission to post this at your site, or send it on to others. There are no ads (though it does give my web site, as well as yours, at the end).
The full 1 hour Radio Ecoshock show for this week is now ready and being distributed.
After a brief introduction, I run
1. Arnie Gundersen interview
2. News recordings, mostly from English language Japanese TV about the site, government response, and various eye-opening admissions
3. An interview with California nuclear activist Ace Hoffman (a chat)
4. More suggestions of conspiracy, such as:
* a political fight to unseat PM Kan;
* the possibility that Japan's nuclear power industry is also secretly preparing nuclear materials for their own bomb, if ever needed;
* a fight described in Bloomberg between nuclear alliances (and countries) to get the multi-billion dollar, decades long contract to "dismantle" the Fukushima 1 site.
5. I also play clips from a song about Fukushima by a Bob Dylan tribute artist in Germany. Find that song here on You tube.
The CD quality version of this week's Radio Ecoshock show is 56 MB here:
http://www.ecoshock.net/eshock11/ES_110415_Show.mp3
The Lo-Fi 14 MB version is here:
http://www.ecoshock.net/eshock11/ES_110415_Show_LoFi.mp3
The blog which describes some of this, with a whack of links, is here:
http://www.ecoshock.info/2011/04/fukushima-nuclear-mutiny.html
Use those links or files as you wish.
Thanks so much for talking with me. You made me feel better, sort of like calling a friend.
Alex Smith Radio Ecoshock http://www.ecoshock.org
###
---------------------------------------------------------- (5) How the URL got messed up last time (excuses, excuses...) by Ace Hoffman: ----------------------------------------------------------
April 14th, 2011
World Nuclear Association attempts to track who uses their articles by sending people to a different address from the actual one. They do that with their articles, too. That's why, when I give the URLs for their articles, I use the print versions, which they don't seem to have figured out a way to track.
On today's earlier email, I partially prevented WNA from tracking who used their attempt to "stack the deck", by sending the email in "plain text" format, as I always do, but the software tacked on the period at the end of their URL and I didn't notice (I had used the email to vote, forgetting about their tracking mechanism...). Hopefully most of you figured it out.
It's interesting to note that WNA wants to track the newsletters they send out so carefully. Isn't it? As of 10 minutes ago (345 pm PST, April 14th, 2011) voting was still open and the "201" address below worked for two people.
Sincerely
Ace Hoffman Carlsbad, CA
follow-up: At 11:19 AM 4/14/2011 -0700, John Carpenter wrote: Ace, URL still not working....."reset" message. Bests, John
-------------------------------
Yeah, not for me either.. and I just used it before I sent that... hmmmmmmmm
This is the URL as it worked. Totally the same now....
http://www.economist.com/debate/days/view/681
And the voting was neck-and-neck until the WNA flooded it (actually, I think the anti-view was ahead...).
Thanks,
Ace -------------------------------
Another possible URL: http://www.economist.com/debate/debates/overview/201
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---------------------------------------------------------- (6) Contact information for the author of this newsletter:
-----------------------------------------
Ace Hoffman
Author, The Code Killers:
An Expose of the Nuclear Industry
Free download: acehoffman.org
Blog: acehoffman.blogspot.com
YouTube: youtube.com/user/AceHoffman
Carlsbad, CA
Email: ace [at] acehoffman.org
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