Cancer risk for radiation workers
Citizens' Initiative Omega | 14.08.2003 20:21 | Anti-militarism | Globalisation | Health | London | World
CARTAGENA: MORE SCHOOLS AND DEATHS OF INNOCENT - Health fears over RAF radar - INFO ON RADAR - Hum Survey - Radiation research under a safe threshold level? - Origins and characteristics of Gulf War Disease - New Iraqi army takes aim at US-led coalition - Pots and kettles
CARTAGENA: MORE SCHOOLS AND DEATHS OF INNOCENT
-----------------------------------------------
Three cases of cancer in the School of San Vicente Paúl of Cartagena have shaken all those collective, that we find us sensitized by this theme, nowadays silenced by the authorities of a good number of countries, that aim at the tactic of delay and to do not accuse receipt of the anxieties of hundreds of parents worried about their children.
We are sure that many of the readers of these lines neither even ears to speak of the School San Vicente Paúl of Cartagena and in the meantime one must refer the death of two girls of twelve and fourteen years occurred in the three last months. "Both suffered under cancer and one of them died of leukemia in twenty days, comments Ascensión. To these deaths, adds the illness of a third boy that is found hospitalized in these moments by a tumor " (La Verdad de Murcia ).
"...The students passed away had class in... the part of the school that is more near the antenna " ? Social Alarm ? Social alarm that maintains us awake and does us made to spokesmen of the common sense that the government and its ministers lacks.
In March 2001 El Periódico de Aragón gave account of the death, by sudden death, of a baby of five months in a preschool of Zaragoza and the same newspaper registered other four sudden cases of death in the last four previous months to the date referred. There was a strange relation of the deaths with the phone system base stations proximity regarding the preschools (El Periódico de Aragón 30/3/2001).
The parents of the students cannot remain quiet, before the permanent danger is being overcome for our children, neither an antenna in operation without license.
Because the danger and the harmfulness of the base stations is not accepted, based on more studies that a person only can come to read during the course of its life, let us rebel against the great garantes and scrupulous guards of the urban development norms of our country.
NEITHER A SINGLE ANTENNA FUNCTIONING WITHOUT PERMISSION OR WITH PERMISSION GRANTED WITH VIOLATION OF THE LAWS!
We have, nevertheless, the clear conviction that the danger of the referred installations for the health is patent and responsible day for day for the death of innocent, as the two girls of 12 and 14 years, students of the Colegio San Vicente Paúl de Cartagena, that have been victims of the injustice.
Two girls that have a place in our hearts and a smiling face in the border of the assembly of students of their course of Secondary. Ours greater desires of recovery for the student of the same center that was hospitalized, whose face, we expect, can experience the changes of the time and the different ages of their skin.
They receive here our solidarity and homage before the suffering of the parents and students of the Colegio San Vicente Paúl de Cartagena.
Who want to help us to maintain brought up to date the data, or who want to add centers to ours (Omega: till now about 130 centers), can send an e-mail with the information to the direction of the Association of Neighbors Against Harmful Radiation of L’Scale (Asociación de Vecinos Contra Radiaciones Nocivas de L'Escala (Girona)
avecorn@hotmail.com.
Asociación de Vecinos Contra Radiaciones Nocivas de L'Escala (Girona), 14 of July of 2003.
Translation (excerpt) from Spanish to English: Omega
--------
BBC Inside Out - Health fears over RAF radar
--------------------------------------------
SCIENTIST | Dr Richard Albanese fears the radiation's effects
A senior US Air Force scientist has told the BBC he would not buy a house near Britain’s biggest radar base because he fears its radiation could pose a serious health risk.
The role of RAF Fylingdales on the North York Moors is set to be expanded under plans for President Bush’s new Star Wars missile defence system.
But Inside Out can reveal that an almost identical base on Cape Cod in the USA is at the centre of a $5m investigation into an unexplained cluster of rare cancers in the local community.
Cancer fears
Emissions from Flyingdales are within legal limits
In an exclusive interview, serving US Air Force researcher, Dr Richard Albanese says he fears Phased Array Radiation from radars may have carcinogenic properties that science has yet to understand.
What makes Dr Albanese’s claims more disturbing is that he was a member of the medical team that first identified Agent Orange - a defoliant used during the Vietnam war - as the cause of unexplained cancers in American veterans.
He’s now running the Cape Cod tests, which were ordered after local medical experts identified raised levels of breast and lung cancer in young women near the Sagamore base, 70 miles from Boston.
Legal limits
Emissions from the radar, like those at Fylingdales, are well within legal limits.
Tests are being conducted in Cape Code due to cancer clusters
However, some researchers are now questioning whether the complex waves of electro-magnetic radiation from Phased Array bases should be subject to tighter regulation. Some experiments have suggested they can actually damage DNA. Dr Albanese says, "Technology seems to lead our medical understanding by somewhere between 10 and 20 years in almost every incident I have worked on."
He compared his concerns to those over X-Rays, asbestos and lead in fuel in the years leading up to scientific proof they could damage health.
No known effects
There’s no evidence of a cancer cluster in the Fylingdales area but the Yorkshire Cancer Register confirmed no research has yet been done in the area. The only known effect emissions from the base have is on local motorists. Numerous breakdowns on the busy A171 are due to interference with car alarms and immobilisers.
Resident’s anger
Jackie and her husband are considering moving
Local campaigner Jackie Fearnley says she’s shocked by Inside Out’s revelations from America. These come only months after the Ministry of Defence reassured local people that the British base was safe. Jackie, who lives in Goathland, says, "My husband and I have talked seriously about whether we go on living in such a place." "We’ve seen the way America decides policy purely to suit themselves and we are not necessarily going to be in very much control or given much information." "We really must ask, ‘is this the right thing for us?’"
Cape Cod campaigner Richard Judge warned people in Goathland, "I would make sure the people in Britain understand they’ve been given a system that may not be safe."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/yorkslincs/series3/radiation_RAF_radar_yorkshire_health_cancer_fears_risk.shtml
and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2317269.stm
Cancer risk for radiation workers
---------------------------------
The radiation comes from the black sands
People who are exposed to even low levels of radiation at work may be at risk of cancer, scientists have suggested. They believe that current safety limits may be too high and that more research needs to be done to protect health workers, scientists and others who come into contact with radioactive materials.
Scientists from Britain and Germany have found that prolonged exposure to relatively low doses of radiation can cause mutations in human DNA.
Maybe it is happening to genes that have been linked to cancer
Dr Peter Forster, McDonald Institute
They have suggested that it may also affect genes that have been linked with leukaemia and other cancers. The scientists analysed the effects of radiation exposure on nearly 1,000 people living in southern India.
Natural radiation
These people live in Kerala, which has one of the highest natural background radiation in the world. The radiation is caused by monazite sands which contain the radioactive element, thorium. These sands are washed down from nearby mountains and accumulate on the sea shore.
The study examined people from Kerala, India
The vast majority of people living in this area are fishermen and come into regular contact with the sands. The scientists examined the effects of the radiation on mitochondrial DNA - the tiny energy factories which power cells. They found that those exposed to radiation had higher levels of "point mutations" in their mitochondrial DNA. A "point mutation'' takes place when a single "base'' - the genetic code is made up of four bases - along a DNA strand gets changed.
People who lived locally but were not exposed to the radioactive sands had significantly fewer mutations. The mutations affect non-coding DNA and do not have an impact on health. However, the scientists have suggested that encoding genes - those that can trigger disease - could also be affected. They added that the findings raise serious questions about the levels of radiation people can be exposed to at work.
The people in the study were exposed to radiation which is 10 times greater than the worldwide average. However, those who are exposed to radiation at work are allowed to receive up to 50 times the normal level.
Safety review
Dr Peter Forster of the Molecular Genetics Laboratory at the McDonald Institute at the University of Cambridge, said these safety limits should be reviewed. "These findings may be cause for rethinking whether the maximum levels for radiation exposure at work should be brought down." Speaking to BBC News Online, he added: "This section of DNA will always be non-coding but we only looked at this bit.
"Perhaps it is happening to other genes and maybe it is happening to genes that have been linked to cancer."
The study is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Informant: Robert Riedlinger
--------
INFO ON RADAR
-------------
Sianette Kwee -- ALL THE INFO I HAVE FOUND ON RADAR IS POSTED ON MY FRONT PAGE -- FLASHRADAR FRONT PAGE
http://members.toast.net/flashradar/flashx.html
I HOPE THIS HELPS -- DOUG POOLEY TOLEDO OHIO USA
--------
Hum Survey
----------
Dear Klaus,
Some of your readers may be aware of the phenomena known as The Hum, a perceived low frequency noise accompanied by a variety of adverse health effects caused by radio transmissions.
The results of an interesting and detailed survey of a 100 Hum sufferers is available at http://www.hum-survey.com
Best Regards
John Dawes
--------
Can radio frequency radiation research at all been done under a safe threshold level???
----------------------------------------------------------------
The controversy in adequate assessment of the hazards of radiofrequency radiation stems from the lack of explicit data. Unfortunately there is still no specific long term exposure research to establish data as we know it from X-ray exposure, where after a given exposure a rest or recovery period is mandatory. If we consider a similar accumulation in the area of microwave exposure and accept for involuntary permanent exposure a rate at 1% of this 0.3 mW/cm² resulting in a value of 3µW/cm², we are likely at a level which may already been exceeded in some areas. (Recall from above - 1970 in the USA- 1µW/cm² in cities).
A different calculation derived from the electrophonic effect - described above - leads to much lower values. If we use the before mentioned values of 0.1 mW/cm² and 65 dB noise level and that the clicking sound has to be about 3 dB above that ambient noise to be clearly perceived, it allows us to assume that 0.1 mW/cm² cause an equal effect as a 68 dB sound level.If we compare this to a 8 dB sound level which is considered "quiet" the difference of 60 dB calculates to a value that is one Million times smaller. This means that for an equivalent energy level to be perceived as quiet the radio frequency density level would have to be about 0.1 nW/cm² = 100 pW/cm². ( the 0 db level or - perceptive threshold - would then be equivalent to 15.8 picoW/cm². - 19.02 1999 - W.W.S )
If we consider this value, an ambient radiation level of 1µW/cm² (as measured for 1970) is already 10 000 times higher. All our universities and research facilities are most likely exposed to such levels, so it seems puzzling that there research could been done to establish a safe threshold level that may have been exceeded decades ago!
Nobody has ever established what level of radio frequency radiation is safe or unsafe for permanent accumulative exposure with no recovery period. A situation that has concerned people already demanding a moratorium on any further expansion of wireless communications.
http://www.reach.net/~scherer/p/biofx.htm#acc2
--------
Origins and characteristics of Gulf War Disease
-----------------------------------------------
A short slide summary about the origins and characteristics of Gulf War Disease has been added to the Tom Bearden Website at
http://www.cheniere.org/misc/gulfwar/index.htm
Regards
Tony Craddock
Web Administrator
The Tom Bearden Website
www.cheniere.org
--------
New Iraqi army takes aim at US-led coalition
http://tinyurl.com/jv66
Pots and kettles
http://cei.org/gencon/019,03599.cfm
-----------------------------------------------
Three cases of cancer in the School of San Vicente Paúl of Cartagena have shaken all those collective, that we find us sensitized by this theme, nowadays silenced by the authorities of a good number of countries, that aim at the tactic of delay and to do not accuse receipt of the anxieties of hundreds of parents worried about their children.
We are sure that many of the readers of these lines neither even ears to speak of the School San Vicente Paúl of Cartagena and in the meantime one must refer the death of two girls of twelve and fourteen years occurred in the three last months. "Both suffered under cancer and one of them died of leukemia in twenty days, comments Ascensión. To these deaths, adds the illness of a third boy that is found hospitalized in these moments by a tumor " (La Verdad de Murcia ).
"...The students passed away had class in... the part of the school that is more near the antenna " ? Social Alarm ? Social alarm that maintains us awake and does us made to spokesmen of the common sense that the government and its ministers lacks.
In March 2001 El Periódico de Aragón gave account of the death, by sudden death, of a baby of five months in a preschool of Zaragoza and the same newspaper registered other four sudden cases of death in the last four previous months to the date referred. There was a strange relation of the deaths with the phone system base stations proximity regarding the preschools (El Periódico de Aragón 30/3/2001).
The parents of the students cannot remain quiet, before the permanent danger is being overcome for our children, neither an antenna in operation without license.
Because the danger and the harmfulness of the base stations is not accepted, based on more studies that a person only can come to read during the course of its life, let us rebel against the great garantes and scrupulous guards of the urban development norms of our country.
NEITHER A SINGLE ANTENNA FUNCTIONING WITHOUT PERMISSION OR WITH PERMISSION GRANTED WITH VIOLATION OF THE LAWS!
We have, nevertheless, the clear conviction that the danger of the referred installations for the health is patent and responsible day for day for the death of innocent, as the two girls of 12 and 14 years, students of the Colegio San Vicente Paúl de Cartagena, that have been victims of the injustice.
Two girls that have a place in our hearts and a smiling face in the border of the assembly of students of their course of Secondary. Ours greater desires of recovery for the student of the same center that was hospitalized, whose face, we expect, can experience the changes of the time and the different ages of their skin.
They receive here our solidarity and homage before the suffering of the parents and students of the Colegio San Vicente Paúl de Cartagena.
Who want to help us to maintain brought up to date the data, or who want to add centers to ours (Omega: till now about 130 centers), can send an e-mail with the information to the direction of the Association of Neighbors Against Harmful Radiation of L’Scale (Asociación de Vecinos Contra Radiaciones Nocivas de L'Escala (Girona)
avecorn@hotmail.com. Asociación de Vecinos Contra Radiaciones Nocivas de L'Escala (Girona), 14 of July of 2003.
Translation (excerpt) from Spanish to English: Omega
--------
BBC Inside Out - Health fears over RAF radar
--------------------------------------------
SCIENTIST | Dr Richard Albanese fears the radiation's effects
A senior US Air Force scientist has told the BBC he would not buy a house near Britain’s biggest radar base because he fears its radiation could pose a serious health risk.
The role of RAF Fylingdales on the North York Moors is set to be expanded under plans for President Bush’s new Star Wars missile defence system.
But Inside Out can reveal that an almost identical base on Cape Cod in the USA is at the centre of a $5m investigation into an unexplained cluster of rare cancers in the local community.
Cancer fears
Emissions from Flyingdales are within legal limits
In an exclusive interview, serving US Air Force researcher, Dr Richard Albanese says he fears Phased Array Radiation from radars may have carcinogenic properties that science has yet to understand.
What makes Dr Albanese’s claims more disturbing is that he was a member of the medical team that first identified Agent Orange - a defoliant used during the Vietnam war - as the cause of unexplained cancers in American veterans.
He’s now running the Cape Cod tests, which were ordered after local medical experts identified raised levels of breast and lung cancer in young women near the Sagamore base, 70 miles from Boston.
Legal limits
Emissions from the radar, like those at Fylingdales, are well within legal limits.
Tests are being conducted in Cape Code due to cancer clusters
However, some researchers are now questioning whether the complex waves of electro-magnetic radiation from Phased Array bases should be subject to tighter regulation. Some experiments have suggested they can actually damage DNA. Dr Albanese says, "Technology seems to lead our medical understanding by somewhere between 10 and 20 years in almost every incident I have worked on."
He compared his concerns to those over X-Rays, asbestos and lead in fuel in the years leading up to scientific proof they could damage health.
No known effects
There’s no evidence of a cancer cluster in the Fylingdales area but the Yorkshire Cancer Register confirmed no research has yet been done in the area. The only known effect emissions from the base have is on local motorists. Numerous breakdowns on the busy A171 are due to interference with car alarms and immobilisers.
Resident’s anger
Jackie and her husband are considering moving
Local campaigner Jackie Fearnley says she’s shocked by Inside Out’s revelations from America. These come only months after the Ministry of Defence reassured local people that the British base was safe. Jackie, who lives in Goathland, says, "My husband and I have talked seriously about whether we go on living in such a place." "We’ve seen the way America decides policy purely to suit themselves and we are not necessarily going to be in very much control or given much information." "We really must ask, ‘is this the right thing for us?’"
Cape Cod campaigner Richard Judge warned people in Goathland, "I would make sure the people in Britain understand they’ve been given a system that may not be safe."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/yorkslincs/series3/radiation_RAF_radar_yorkshire_health_cancer_fears_risk.shtml and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2317269.stm Cancer risk for radiation workers
---------------------------------
The radiation comes from the black sands
People who are exposed to even low levels of radiation at work may be at risk of cancer, scientists have suggested. They believe that current safety limits may be too high and that more research needs to be done to protect health workers, scientists and others who come into contact with radioactive materials.
Scientists from Britain and Germany have found that prolonged exposure to relatively low doses of radiation can cause mutations in human DNA.
Maybe it is happening to genes that have been linked to cancer
Dr Peter Forster, McDonald Institute
They have suggested that it may also affect genes that have been linked with leukaemia and other cancers. The scientists analysed the effects of radiation exposure on nearly 1,000 people living in southern India.
Natural radiation
These people live in Kerala, which has one of the highest natural background radiation in the world. The radiation is caused by monazite sands which contain the radioactive element, thorium. These sands are washed down from nearby mountains and accumulate on the sea shore.
The study examined people from Kerala, India
The vast majority of people living in this area are fishermen and come into regular contact with the sands. The scientists examined the effects of the radiation on mitochondrial DNA - the tiny energy factories which power cells. They found that those exposed to radiation had higher levels of "point mutations" in their mitochondrial DNA. A "point mutation'' takes place when a single "base'' - the genetic code is made up of four bases - along a DNA strand gets changed.
People who lived locally but were not exposed to the radioactive sands had significantly fewer mutations. The mutations affect non-coding DNA and do not have an impact on health. However, the scientists have suggested that encoding genes - those that can trigger disease - could also be affected. They added that the findings raise serious questions about the levels of radiation people can be exposed to at work.
The people in the study were exposed to radiation which is 10 times greater than the worldwide average. However, those who are exposed to radiation at work are allowed to receive up to 50 times the normal level.
Safety review
Dr Peter Forster of the Molecular Genetics Laboratory at the McDonald Institute at the University of Cambridge, said these safety limits should be reviewed. "These findings may be cause for rethinking whether the maximum levels for radiation exposure at work should be brought down." Speaking to BBC News Online, he added: "This section of DNA will always be non-coding but we only looked at this bit.
"Perhaps it is happening to other genes and maybe it is happening to genes that have been linked to cancer."
The study is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Informant: Robert Riedlinger
--------
INFO ON RADAR
-------------
Sianette Kwee -- ALL THE INFO I HAVE FOUND ON RADAR IS POSTED ON MY FRONT PAGE -- FLASHRADAR FRONT PAGE
http://members.toast.net/flashradar/flashx.html I HOPE THIS HELPS -- DOUG POOLEY TOLEDO OHIO USA
--------
Hum Survey
----------
Dear Klaus,
Some of your readers may be aware of the phenomena known as The Hum, a perceived low frequency noise accompanied by a variety of adverse health effects caused by radio transmissions.
The results of an interesting and detailed survey of a 100 Hum sufferers is available at
http://www.hum-survey.com Best Regards
John Dawes
--------
Can radio frequency radiation research at all been done under a safe threshold level???
----------------------------------------------------------------
The controversy in adequate assessment of the hazards of radiofrequency radiation stems from the lack of explicit data. Unfortunately there is still no specific long term exposure research to establish data as we know it from X-ray exposure, where after a given exposure a rest or recovery period is mandatory. If we consider a similar accumulation in the area of microwave exposure and accept for involuntary permanent exposure a rate at 1% of this 0.3 mW/cm² resulting in a value of 3µW/cm², we are likely at a level which may already been exceeded in some areas. (Recall from above - 1970 in the USA- 1µW/cm² in cities).
A different calculation derived from the electrophonic effect - described above - leads to much lower values. If we use the before mentioned values of 0.1 mW/cm² and 65 dB noise level and that the clicking sound has to be about 3 dB above that ambient noise to be clearly perceived, it allows us to assume that 0.1 mW/cm² cause an equal effect as a 68 dB sound level.If we compare this to a 8 dB sound level which is considered "quiet" the difference of 60 dB calculates to a value that is one Million times smaller. This means that for an equivalent energy level to be perceived as quiet the radio frequency density level would have to be about 0.1 nW/cm² = 100 pW/cm². ( the 0 db level or - perceptive threshold - would then be equivalent to 15.8 picoW/cm². - 19.02 1999 - W.W.S )
If we consider this value, an ambient radiation level of 1µW/cm² (as measured for 1970) is already 10 000 times higher. All our universities and research facilities are most likely exposed to such levels, so it seems puzzling that there research could been done to establish a safe threshold level that may have been exceeded decades ago!
Nobody has ever established what level of radio frequency radiation is safe or unsafe for permanent accumulative exposure with no recovery period. A situation that has concerned people already demanding a moratorium on any further expansion of wireless communications.
http://www.reach.net/~scherer/p/biofx.htm#acc2 --------
Origins and characteristics of Gulf War Disease
-----------------------------------------------
A short slide summary about the origins and characteristics of Gulf War Disease has been added to the Tom Bearden Website at
http://www.cheniere.org/misc/gulfwar/index.htm Regards
Tony Craddock
Web Administrator
The Tom Bearden Website
www.cheniere.org
--------
New Iraqi army takes aim at US-led coalition
http://tinyurl.com/jv66 Pots and kettles
http://cei.org/gencon/019,03599.cfm
Citizens' Initiative Omega
