[ RadSafe ] Sternglass => Mangano scaremongering =>was:RE:Sci.Am. about Fukushima and US Pacific NW infant mortality

[Busby, Chris]

The paper by Whyte shows increases in infant mortality , neonatal mortality and stillbirths in the USA and also in England and Wales over a long period of time. 

Whyte,R.K (1992) `First Day Neonatal Mortality since 1935: A Re-examination of the Cross Hypothesis’, British Medical Journal, 304: 343-6.

This is a longer period than was considered by Ernest Sternglass, who she cites in her paper. Sternglass was writing in 1971. What she shows in her paper is that there were increases in all these indicators over the period of the fallout 1959-63, not just in USA but also in England and Wales. Dapra's explanation that it was something about blacks in New York was nonsense as it also happened in England and Wales. There is no need for any other reference apart from Whyte: the graphs are there to see and her conclusions also.
Incidentally, the fallout was highest in Wales because of the high rainfall the Sr90 was 3 times higher and was measured by the Agricultural Research Council. In Wakes the infant mortality was a sharp peak. I obtained all the causes of death from the Registrar General for England and Wales in 1994 to see what they died of. The most common cause was congenital heart defects. The trend followed the Sr90 in milk exactly. Sr 90 was also examined in mice by Luning and Frolen in Sweden:

Luning K.G, Frolen, H., Nelson, A and Roennbaeck, C. (1963), 'Genetic effects of Strontium-90 on immature germ cells in mice.' Nature No 4980 199: 303-4
Luning, K. G., Frolen, H., Nelson, A., and Ronnback, C. (1963), `Genetic Effects of Strontium-90 Injected into Male Mice', Nature, No 4864 197: 304-5.
 

They compared it with Cs-137. The baby mice died after the Sr90 but not the Cs137. Smirnova and Lyaginskaya in 1969 did the same experiment in rats (inject father, unexposed mother) and the dead babies had heart defects. 

Smirnova, E. I. and Lyaginska, A. M. (1969), `Heart Development of Sr-90 Injured Rats', in Y. I. Moskalev and Y. I. Izd (eds.), Radioaktiv Izotopy Organizs (Moscow: Medizina), 348.



I wrote all this up in my 1995 book Wings of Death. 

Busby, C. C. (1995), Wings of Death: Nuclear Pollution and Human Health  (Aberystwyth: Green Audit)



I will get round to publishing it sometime.

Chris

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