From Summer 2019 Forum

An article that appeared in an issue of The New York Times that was written by Matthew L. Wald was entitled “U.S. Acknowledges Radiation Killed Weapons Workers”. Mr. Wald began his article by writing, “After decades of denials, the government is conceding that since the dawn of the atomic age, workers making nuclear weapons have been exposed to radiation and chemicals that have produced cancer and early death.”

A draft that was written up by a dozen government agencies prompted by President Clinton. Before that, the government had “minimized the hazards of radiation.”

One of the plants that was studied but is today shuttered was in Tennessee. That factory’s work was to enrich uranium. The article states, “The industrial process used at the plant exposed workers to radiation and chemical hazards from uranium, plutonium and fluorine. The union says workers at the plant have higher-levels-than-expected rates of leukemia, cancer of the lung and bladder, vision difiiculties and chronic fatigue syndrome, among other health problems.”

Another article that was originally printed via Inside Science News was written by Valerie Brown and was titled “Decades After Bomb-making, the Radioactive Waste Remains Dangerous.” Indeed, the article notes that damage has created “human risk for centuries to come”. This site in Washington was supposed to be ended in 2018 yet it is still under construction today due to “delays, cost overruns, poor oversight of contractors, agency restructuring, policy roadblocks and administrative snafus.” The plant, itself, if dangerous but “It’s generally only harmfil if a person ingests or inhales it” and toxins in the air can go anywhere it wants via wind, storms or even clouds.

In late March of this year, Dr. Helen Caldicott was interviewed by Global Research’s Michael Welch on the eighth year anniversary of the triple meltdown that happened in Japan at the nuclear facility Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility. Dr. Caldicott is the president of a national research institute that educated the public about the dangers of radiation plants and how these dangers can last for years and years. Despite storage containers and filtering methods, there is water that comes flowing down from mountains, goes under the reactors and into the Pacific which is very radioactive and, she says, “Over time the Pacific is going to become more and more radioactive.” The World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA) signed a contract to help but since the ocean continuous to be contaminated and, she states, “There are ongoing emissions into the air consistently. . .They signed a document, I think, in ’59, with the IAEA that they would not report any medical effects of radiological disasters and they’ve stuck to that. . .they sold themselves to the devil.” When Dr. Caldicott was asked about Chernobyl, she said, “By now over a million people have already died from the Chernobyl disaster. And many diseases have been caused by that. . .they’ve closed down the air-bome radioactive measuring machines off the west coast of America.”