Tooth Fairy Project releases Long Island results

[peter genzer <genzer@BNL.GOV>]

All,



Here's an article from today's Long Island Newsday on the Tooth Fairy

Project's latest press conference. Lots of little nuggets here - " a

group of scientists who are anti-nuclear activists,"  "the findings of

their unorthodox study," etc.



Pete Genzer

Media and Communications Office 

Brookhaven National Laboratory

                                     

>From http://www.newsday.com/coverage/current/news/thursday/nd1011.htm 



Study of Teeth Finds High Radiation 

But other experts dispute anti-nuke group's findings

                                          

by Dan Fagin

Staff Writer



Charging that nuclear reactors are to blame, a group of scientists who

are anti-nuclear activists said yesterday they have found increasing and

"ominously high" levels of radioactivity in more than 1,300 baby teeth,

including 603 from Long Islanders. 



But other experts said yesterday that the levels of radioactive

strontium-90 found in teeth analyzed by the Brooklyn-based Radiation and

Public Health Project are minuscule, far too low to be a health threat.

Larger and more scientifically sophisticated studies, they added, have

discounted claims by the Brooklyn group and others that people who live

near nuclear power plants are more likely to get cancer. 



At a news conference in Mineola, the authors asserted that the findings

of their unorthodox study support a hypothesized link between

above-average cancer rates on Long Island and emissions from nearby

nuclear reactors. There are four commercial reactors across Long Island

Sound in Connecticut, three in Westchester County and two now-closed

research reactors at Brookhaven National Laboratory. 



The authors acknowledged, however, that levels of radioactivity in teeth

they collected from Long Island and Connecticut residents were actually

lower than what they found in teeth they collected from each of the

other areas they studied: New York City, California, Florida and New

Jersey. 



"We ourselves cannot implicate any particular reactor at Brookhaven or

anywhere else, but we believe our findings are important and need to be

followed up, and they obviously provide ammunition to the anti-nuclear

movement," said Jay Gould, an epidemiologist and longtime activist who

heads the Radiation and Public Health Project, a nonprofit group. 



The study's authors found that levels of strontium-90 in 44 teeth they

collected from Connecticut residents averaged 0.96 trillionths of a

Curie (a unit measure of radiation) per gram of calcium. For 544 teeth

collected in Suffolk County the average level was 1.38, while the 59

teeth from Nassau residents averaged 1.25 and the 78 teeth from New York

City averaged 1.44. 



They found that the state with the highest average strontium level in

teeth was Florida, with a statewide average of 2.08, followed by

California at 1.73 and New Jersey at 1.55. Though higher than levels in

teeth from Long Island or New York City, the strontium levels in those

three states are still far lower than an earlier nationwide tooth study

found in 1964, a few months after above-ground nuclear weapons tests

were banned by treaty. That year, the nationwide average strontium

concentration in teeth was 11.03 trillionths of a Curie. 



Gould, 86, lives in East Hampton and his group has drawn much of its

financial support from celebrity neighbors. The group launched its

"Tooth Fairy Project" four years ago. 



Joseph Mangano, the group's national coordinator, said the study's most

surprising finding is that strontium-90 levels appear to be on the rise

and have reached what Gould asserts are "ominous" levels. In Suffolk

County, for example, strontium levels in the teeth of children born

between 1993 and 1996 are 40 percent higher than in the baby teeth of

children born between 1981 and 1984. 



The study's findings conflict sharply with the views of most radiation

experts and the federal government. "If there's any trace of

strontium-90 showing up in baby teeth today it is likely the result of

earlier atmospheric bomb tests, rather than infinitesimal releases from

nuclear power plants," said Sue Gagner, a spokeswoman for the federal

Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

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