[ RadSafe ] " Port Hope activists call on Health Canada to study alleged uranium contamination "

[Franta, Jaroslav]

The last article is the latest one, reviewing the activists' claims.....

Jaro
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


Port Hope activists call on Health Canada to study alleged uranium contamination
Globe and Mail, 14 November 2007 
MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT, ENVIRONMENT REPORTER

Health Canada needs to fund a thorough study of residents of Port Hope, Ont., to investigate whether exposure to uranium is causing illnesses, says a local community group that conducted its own testing and detected what it says are elevated levels of the dangerous element in a number of residents. 

Faye More, chair of the Port Hope Community Health Concerns Committee, told a news conference yesterday that the costs of a study should be covered by the federal department, but the design should be under the control of local residents. 

The group released the results of tests yesterday of nine people who had either worked in Port Hope's nuclear-processing businesses or lived near the plants, and who were checked for the amount of uranium in their bodies. Although it was a relatively small number of people, the testing found that five of them had uranium levels substantially above two test subjects who didn't have Port Hope exposures. One child had readings three times higher than the average of the two so-called controls, while one of the adults had levels eight times the controls, according to the group. 

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, the federal atomic watchdog, declined to comment on the findings. "CNSC staff is in the process of reviewing the study and is not in a position to comment at the present time," said Aurèle Gervais, a spokesman for the agency. 

Health Canada issued a statement yesterday saying Health Minister Tony Clement has directed staff to look at the findings. "If action is required, we will act," the statement said. 

The local group did the tests at its own expense because it distrusts previous studies by Health Canada that concluded residents of Port Hope have cancer-incidence rates similar to the provincial average. 

Testing done on small numbers of people is open to criticism that the results may be due to chance. But the group said it only had enough money - $11,000 - to pay for 11 urine samples to be analyzed at a state-of-the art laboratory at a German university. 

Some residents fear they are being chronically exposed to dangerous levels of uranium from the community's nuclear-processing facilities and from the legacy of past dumping of large quantities of radioactive soil in the area. 

Cameco, the world's largest uranium producer, operates plants in Port Hope that process the metal into forms that can be used in atomic power plants, but it says all of its emissions are well below Canadian regulatory standards. Company spokesman Lyle Krahn said Cameco wants to review the test results found by the group. "We take the health and safety of our employees seriously," he said. 
---------------------------


Port Hope residents fear uranium fallout; 
Urge Health Canada study after citizen-funded tests suggest possible health risks from contamination
Hamilton Spectator, 14 November 2007 
Michael Oliveira, The Canadian Press

Residents of a small Ontario town that's home to two nuclear industries held up their own self-funded research yesterday as proof their lives are being threatened by uranium contamination. 

After their pleas for federal government study and research went nowhere, the community of about 16,000 organized fundraising walks, silent auctions and sold chocolates to raise the $11,000 that was needed to send some test samples overseas for analysis. 

The group now says the worst fears have been confirmed and the results show their picturesque town is being plagued by an invisible killer -- uranium contamination. 

"(Port Hope) is a beautiful, lovely community with a wonderful community spirit but it has a harsh environment," Faye More, chairwoman of the Port Hope Community Health Concerns Committee, said at a news conference in Toronto. 

"It is the home to two nuclear industries that have been there for decades operating without a buffer zone from the people, emitting uranium to air and to water every day." 

Port Hope is the site of the largest cleanup of radioactive soil in North American history, and is currently home to the Cameco uranium refinery, which processes uranium hexafluoride for U.S. nuclear reactors. 

The committee's research is based on urine samples from four former nuclear workers, five residents with unexplained health ailments -- including one child -- and two control subjects. 

Four of the test subjects tested positive for uranium contamination and the study suggests the residents may have become infected through inhaling radioactive dust. 

Tedd Weyman, deputy director of the Uranium Medical Research Centre, said the results, which have been studied by scientists, are a very small sample but at least prove that the federal government should be taking a serious look at what's happening in the community. 

"Who has spent $5 studying one human being in Port Hope since the turn of the century ... who has spent any money doing any research? Not Health Canada, not the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission." 

He noted that three of the workers are now retired and supposedly haven't been exposed to uranium for 11, 17 and 23 years, and yet they continue to test positive for it in high numbers. 

And it's very concerning that the tests have turned up uranium associated with the waste from nuclear reactors and U.S. weaponry from the 1980s, Weyman added. 

A statement from Health Canada said federal Health Minister Tony Clement has asked that his staff review the report. "If action is required, we will act," the statement reads. 

A spokesman for Cameco said the company will not comment on the report until it has a chance to read it but added that it's confident its operations are safe. 

Toxic elements that have been found in the area include above-average levels of the radioactive metals radium and uranium, as well as arsenic, radon and lead. 

On Monday, Glenn Case of the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management Office, which is handling the cleanup for Natural Resources Canada, said earlier studies found no need to conduct human testing. 
==============================



Port Hope Evening Guide (uranium contamination)
Canadian Press, 20 November 2007
BY JOYCE CASSIN 

PORT HOPE, Ont. _ Tests released last week that had residents of this community east of Toronto concerned their lives were being threatened by uranium contamination actually show they have nothing to worry about, a Health Canada spokesman says. 

All the measurements in the study undertaken by the Port Hope Community Health Concerns Committee are consistent with very low concentrations of uranium, Dr. Jack Cornett, director of radiation for Health Canada, said Tuesday. 

After reviewing the report released Nov. 13 by the committee and the Uranium Medical Research Centre of Toronto, Cornett told town council Tuesday night those results have effectively given Port Hope a clean bill of health once again. 

Health Canada and other individual studies have confirmed low levels of uranium consistent with that across Canada, he said. 

"The measurements of the nine people tested fell within the range typical of what you'd find in Canada, the U.S. and other countries,'' said Cornett. "They are extremely low levels and well below any regulatory limits.'' 

He said that although Health Canada is always looking for new information, the conclusions of the report do not contain anything new. 

"In the absence of new information, Health Canada will continue to rely upon the eight studies it has conducted in Port Hope over the past 20 years, as well as the regular monitoring and quarterly water testing it undertakes there,'' he told council. "All of this monitoring consistently indicates Port Hope residents are not at risk.'' 

Cornett said the report is flawed because of a misinterpretation of its own results dealing with uranium concentrations in urine. 

"There are always ranges of values,'' he said. "The reality is that each of us eat different amounts of carrots each day and some drink well water and some municipal water.'' 

Individuals' diets affect the concentration of uranium in their system. 

"It's important to note that all living things have radioactivity in their bodies,'' he said. "The radioactivity is present naturally in the foods we eat, the water we drink, and the air we breathe.'' 

He said findings showing man-made uranium in the residents tested were typical of that found in people exposed to very low levels of this type of uranium decades ago. 

Naming a level of contamination affecting health at 100, the highest exposure in the findings of the committee report was 0.5, he explained. 

"This is a good news story,'' he said. 

Port Hope is currently home to the Cameco uranium refinery which processes uranium hexafluoride for U.S. nuclear reactors. It's subsidiary, Zircatec Precision Industries, is the main supplier of uranium dioxide fuels to the Canadian CANDU nuclear reactors. 

It used to be the site of a Crown corporation called Eldorado Nuclear Ltd., which developed material used in the nuclear bombs dropped on Japan in 1945. 

Port Hope was classified as an area of low-level historic waste as it was contaminated at a time when radiation was not seen as a severe threat to human and animal health. 

Uranium refinery operations are believed to be responsible for contaminating some 3.5 million cubic metres of soil which now lies under homes, schools, farm fields and the local harbour. 
====================================================



















CONFIDENTIAL AND PRIVILEGED INFORMATION NOTICE

This e-mail, and any attachments, may contain information that
is confidential, subject to copyright, or exempt from disclosure.
Any unauthorized review, disclosure, retransmission, 
dissemination or other use of or reliance on this information 
may be unlawful and is strictly prohibited.  

AVIS D'INFORMATION CONFIDENTIELLE ET PRIVILÉGIÉE

Le présent courriel, et toute pièce jointe, peut contenir de 
l'information qui est confidentielle, régie par les droits 
d'auteur, ou interdite de divulgation. Tout examen, 
divulgation, retransmission, diffusion ou autres utilisations 
non autorisées de l'information ou dépendance non autorisée 
envers celle-ci peut être illégale et est strictement interdite.