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Re: Depleted Uranium website



>http://www.ratical.org/radiation/vzajic/8thchapter.html

>"Depleted uranium's radioactivity may cause severe health problems such >as 
>cancer years after exposure, but DU's chemical toxicity presents the
greatest danger to health in the short term (several weeks or months) after 
exposure. The kidney is considered the target organ for uranium's chemical 
toxicity."
---
Thank you for a good reference. The nude mice (paragraph 8.6) as were used 
are immunodeficient (no thymus, no T-cells, and no rejection of tumor 
transplants). There is probably no reason to question the results of the 
experiments. The part "may cause severe.... as cancer" is the problem - many 
media will build their headline on this but instead write "causes" and 
forget about the chemical toxicity and other aspects of relevance.

A massmedia person who wants to make a story and sees the site above will 
probably not try to understand sections 8.1 - 8.5 (too much chemistry etc) 
and then finally be happy about the title of 8.6: "Cancer Development Caused 
by DU". Most of the rest (9 lines) will also be "tough chemistry" including 
the comparison with nickel. The 9 lines cover an experiment about alpha 
particle hits on human cell nuclei _and_ an experiment with nude mice). The 
transformation seems to be due to chemical toxicity effects rather than 
effects of alpha radiation - but again - explaining that probably doesn't 
make a bestseller.

Concerning the yada, yada, I now got that explained (thanks!) - it relates 
to a TV show (I'm underexposed to that category).

My personal reflections only,

Bjorn Cedervall   bcradsafers@hotmail.com

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