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Cold War Research Baby Teeth Found



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Index:



Cold War Research Baby Teeth Found

Ever cautious Swiss drill for nuclear accident

Greens sue Britain over nuclear fuel plant

Ministry orders recall of radioactive Italian mushrooms

Confab on nuke fusion plant ends, Tokyo to host next meeting

Eagle Building Technologies Presents X-Ray Airport Security Equipment to U.S

More radiation may help some breast cancer patients

Ontario in running for C$12 bln fusion center

============================================



Cold War Research Baby Teeth Found

  

ST. LOUIS (AP) - About 85,000 baby teeth collected from 1959 to 1970 and only 

discovered recently could help pinpoint whether fallout from Cold War nuclear bomb 

tests caused cancer and other health problems years later, researchers say. 



The teeth from the St. Louis Baby Tooth Survey determined that children were 

absorbing radioactive fallout from nuclear bomb tests by the United States and the 

Soviet Union. The study received international attention and helped persuade the 

nation to adopt a 1963 treaty banning atmospheric bomb tests. 



The teeth were found in May in hundreds of boxes by Washington University officials 

cleaning out a school bunker where they'd been stored since the 1970s. They were 

in small envelopes fastened by rusty paper clips to cards with details about the 

children who gave the teeth to science instead of the tooth fairy. 



``We flipped out when we heard about the 85,000 teeth,'' Joseph Mangano, national 

coordinator with the independent, nonprofit Radiation and Public Health Project 

research group, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for a story Friday. ``It was like an 

early Christmas present.'' 



Now, researchers in New York are hoping to find the owners of the teeth and 

determine whether they've experienced health problems, such as thyroid cancer, in 

the decades since. 



Mangano wants anyone born and living in St. Louis from the late 1940s through the 

1960s - especially if they believe they submitted teeth - to contact his group. If 

matched with any of the baby teeth, the person would be mailed a health 

questionnaire. 



``I see no reason not to join in a study like that, to be part of history,'' said Eric 

Pickles, given that his is include among the baby teeth. Pickles, 43, said he hasn't 

had health problems. 



After World War II, the U.S. government set off about 100 nuclear bombs in 

aboveground tests in the West. Public concern about radioactive fallout rose as 

scientists began to find it in the environment and milk supply downwind from the 

explosions. 



The survey, which began in late 1958, became so well-known that letters addressed 

simply ``Tooth Fairy, St. Louis'' got to the committee's office. By the time it ended in 

1970, the project had collected nearly 300,000 baby teeth, mostly within a 150-mile 

radius of St. Louis. 



All seemed forgotten until this spring, when the teeth were found. 



The new study has no funding. The study's results will be published in peer-reviewed 

medical journals, Mangano said. 



On the Net: 



Washington University, http://www.wustl.edu 



Radiation and Public Health Project, http://www.radiation.org 

-----------------



Ever cautious Swiss drill for nuclear accident

  

ZURICH, Nov 9 (Reuters) - As the world wrings its hands over a potential nuclear 

attack by extremists, Switzerland is readying a drill to test how it can cope with an 

accident that spews radiation into the air. 



In the works for more than a year, the exercise next week assumes that an atomic 

weapon contaminates the broad plain that stretches from Lake Geneva to Lake 

Constance, forcing millions into thousands of bomb shelters in houses and public 

buildings. 



"This is absolutely the first time that we are practising for such a thing," Felix Blumer, 

spokesman for the National Alarm Centre, said on Friday. 



With typical Swiss precision, its timing coincides perfectly with growing public 

concern that extremists could unleash biological, chemical or nuclear attacks that 

would outdo even the events of September 11. 



"We could not have picked a better time," Blumer said. 



Government officials, army officers, radiation experts and civil defence groups will 

conduct the computer-simulation drill on Monday and Tuesday from reinforced 

bunkers. Swiss citizens will not actually have to move underground. 



"The assumption is there will be an accident with an atomic weapon that is so 

radioactive that practically the entire Swiss central plain has to go into the 

underground shelters. That of course would have wide-ranging consequences. All 

public life comes to a halt. People are not able to go to work," he said. 



The point of the exercise is not so much getting people into the shelters, as getting 

them out again. 



"How do you communicate that they should come out? Food will be contaminated. 

How do you deal with that? What can you eat, what can't you eat? All these things 

will be examined," Blumer said. 



The drill underscores the importance Switzerland places on civil defence, even years 

after the Cold War. 



Thousands of Swiss homes, hospitals and public structures have basement bomb 

shelters, thanks to a 1963 law requiring them in practically every new building. 



In neutral Switzerland, a nation of 7.2 million that largely escaped the ravages of two 

world wars, telephone books carry instructions on what to do if an attack or accident 

dumps chemicals or radiation. 



A siren system, regularly tested, warns the population to gather emergency rations 

and take cover in shelters now more widely used to store wine, vegetables, suitcases 

and furniture. 

-----------------



Greens sue Britain over nuclear fuel plant

  

LONDON, Nov 8 (Reuters) - Two environmental groups began a legal challenge in 

London's High Court on Thursday against Britain's decision to give the go-ahead for 

a controversial plant to begin manufacturing nuclear fuel. 



A six-metre (20 ft) high model of a nuclear missile accompanied Greenpeace and 

Friends of the Earth as their lawyers argued that the government had acted 

unlawfully in October when it decided to allow state-owned British Nuclear Fuels 

(BNFL) to launch the Sellafield MOX Plant in Cumbria, northwest England. 



"The MOX plant is not only an environmental threat and a potential terrorist target, 

but simply does not make business sense," Greenpeace executive director Stephen 

Tiddle told reporters outside the court. 



The green lawyers said the government had not showed sufficient economic 

justification for the plant, as required by tEU law, because its 470 million pound ($690 

million) cost was not taken into account when assessing its commercial viability. 



It was also argued there was insufficient evidence there would be enough customers 

for the fuel -- a mixture of highly-toxic plutonium and uranium oxides. 



Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth say launching the plant would lead to more 

plutonium production at Sellafield. 



Some nuclear experts believe it would be relatively easy to extract plutonium, which 

could be used in a nuclear device, from MOX fuel rods. 



BNFL said it was awaiting the outcome of the judicial review before the plant. 



BENEFITS V COSTS 



A government-commissioned study, conducted by consulting firm Arthur D. Little and 

published in July, said the plant would deliver net financial benefits of 216 million 

pounds. 



The report also said the cost of not opening the plant could run into hundreds of 

millions of pounds largely due to potential loss of future contracts for THORP, 

BNFL's nuclear reprocessing plant. 



The Sellafield MOX Plant has lain idle since 1996 because regulatory approval to 

start-up was repeatedly withheld over fears it would not make any money. 



BNFL says the MOX plant can be profitable and that it already boasts a healthy order 

book from overseas customers. The group also dismisses suggestions it would be 

easy to extract plutonium from MOX to make a nuclear device. 



More legal battles face BNFL, which had its partial privatisation shelved in 2000 after 

a scandal erupted when it was discovered staff had falsified data on pilot batches of 

MOX fuel sent to customers. 



On Friday, the Irish government will ask the Hamburg-based International Tribunal 

for the Law of the Sea, to order an immediate suspension of the MOX's plant's 

authorisation and to stop the international movement of radioactive material 

associated with the plant in and around the Irish Sea. 

--------------------



Ministry orders recall of radioactive Italian mushrooms

  

TOKYO, Nov. 9 (Kyodo) - The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said Thursday 

36.1 kilograms of porcini mushrooms imported from Italy through Narita airport 

contained levels of cesium 134 and cesium 137 radiation above the government-set 

level. 



Ministry officials told the importer to return the mushrooms to the exporter. 



Radiation leaked from the former Soviet nuclear plant at Chernobyl, which suffered 

one of the worst nuclear accidents on record in 1986, may have polluted the 

mushrooms. 



While excessive radiation levels were frequently detected in imported food products 

in the 1980s, there have been no reports of detection in recent years. 



The last such incident occurred in January 1998 when excessive radiation was 

detected in a cargo of dried porcini mushrooms imported from Italy. 



According to the health ministry, since the accident at Chernobyl, the government set 

the maximum level of cesium 134 and cesium-137 radiation at 370 becquerels per 

kilogram for food products imported from the former Soviet Union and Europe. 



The radiation in the latest cargo of mushrooms from Italy measured 418 becquerels, 

ministry officials said. 



Porcini mushrooms are used in Italian cooking for pasta and sauteed dishes. Given 

that radioactive materials can easily accumulate within mushrooms, imports of 

mushrooms from all countries suspected of nuclear pollution are subject to 

inspection. 

-------------------



Hamaoka reactor pipe likely ruptured quickly: gov't 



SHIZUOKA, Japan Nov. 8 (Kyodo) - Enormous pressure may have suddenly 

cracked a carbon steel pipe Wednesday at a nuclear reactor in Hamaoka, Shizuoka 

Prefecture, resulting in a leakage of steam and some radioactive material in a 

pressure-injection system, the government said Thursday.  



The leak occurred during testing of a start-up system for a high-pressure core 

injection (HPCI) system at the No. 1 reactor unit in Chubu Electric Power Co.'s 

Hamaoka nuclear power plant, the Nagoya-based utility said. 



The HPCI system is designed to cool the reactor core in the event of an emergency. 



The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and 

Industry said it is the first time for such a pipe to crack, and it intends to order similar 

pipes be inspected at other plants in Japan if necessary. 



The agency dispatched four inspectors to the plant and is investigating the cause of 

the incident. 



It said the 1-centimeter-thick, 15-cm-diameter pipe is made of carbon steel. The 

rupture was found in an elbowed part of the pipe, which carries 290 C steam under 

70 atmospheres of pressure. 



The company checks the HPCI system every month and conducts annual overall 

inspections to look for leaks, but had found no problems, it said. 



The agency also said the accident was provisionally designated Level 1, or 

''anomaly,'' on the International Nuclear Event Scale and was a deviation from 

operational safety limits. 



Level 1 is the second category on a scale of 8 that begins at zero. It is more serious 

than a Level Zero ''deviation'' of no safety significance and less serious than a Level 

2 ''incident'' that involves significant spread of contamination or worker overexposure. 



Other Level 1 accidents in Japan include a 1995 sodium leak at a prototype fast-

breeder nuclear reactor in Fukui Prefecture and a massive coolant water leakage in 

1999 at another Fukui reactor. 



In the 1995 accident, 2-3 tons of liquid sodium compounds used as a coolant leaked 

from the Monju reactor in Tsuruga, Fukui, forcing the plant to shut down. 



In the July 1999 event, an estimated 89 tons of radioactive coolant water leaked at 

the No. 2 reactor at Japan Atomic Power Co.'s Tsuruga plant. An 8-centimeter-long 

crack was found in a pipe in a plant containment building. 



Japan's worst nuclear accident, which took place at a uranium processing plant in 

the village of Tokaimura, Ibaraki Prefecture in September 1999, was designated 

Level 4, which has the classification ''accident without significant off-site risk.'' 



On Sept. 30, 1999, a self-sustaining nuclear fission chain reaction occurred at the 

plant, located 120 kilometers northeast of Tokyo, killing two people and exposing 

more than 600 to radiation. 



In the latest mishap, Chubu Electric estimated the level of radioactive material leaked 

to be 400 becquerels per cubic cm. It added it completely shut down the reactor early 

Thursday. 



The HPCI system stopped operating around 5 p.m. Wednesday during a test run 

after smoke alarms in the building went off, it said. 



No fire was reported at the site, and the alarms may have been activated by the 

steam, local government officials said. 



The plant operator immediately began a manual shutdown of the reactor to pinpoint 

the cause of the trouble. The No. 1 unit houses a boiling-water reactor capable of 

generating up to 540,000 kilowatts of electricity. 



The company is cleaning up radioactive materials remaining in the residual heat-

removal system. When the removal is completed, plant employees will investigate 

the cause of the rupture, the utility said. 



The company reported the accident to the state, Shizuoka Prefecture and five towns 

surrounding the plant. 



There is no risk of the radioactive materials leaking outside the plant and no 

employees were confirmed to have been exposed to the radioactive material, it 

added. 

-----------------



Confab on nuke fusion plant ends, Tokyo to host next meeting

  

TOKYO, Nov. 9 (Kyodo) - The first international conference on a planned 

experimental nuclear fusion plant ended Thursday night in Toronto with a second 

conference slated to be held in Tokyo next January, Japanese government officials 

said Friday. 



Government officials from Japan, Russia, Canada and Europe discussed the 

framework of an international accord to build and operate the International 

Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor at the two-day conference. 



Participating countries aim to reach final agreements on matters such as the site of 

the plant and allocation of construction costs by the end of next year, according to 

the officials. 



The reactor will generate electricity through nuclear fusion, using a method similar to 

that of energy generation by the sun. 

---------------



Eagle Building Technologies Presents X-Ray Airport Security Equipment to U.S 

Congress

  

BOCA RATON, Fla., Nov. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- Eagle Building Technologies, Inc. (OTC 

Bulletin Board: EGBT), representative of BioSterile's Insight Detection System, the 

Sentinel(TM), will demonstrate before congressional leaders hashing out the Federal 

Air Security Bill as to how the Sentinel's X-Ray technology engineered for airport 

security checkpoints surpasses today's systems. 



The demonstration comes after the personal invitation by U.S. Representative Jay 

Inslee (D-WA), who has taken a lead role in ensuring 100% baggage checking. 



"It is my hope that by having these demonstrations, we will increase Congress' 

resolve in achieving the goal of screening 100% baggage," said Rep. Inslee. 



Unlike conventional systems currently installed in the majority of America's 450 

commercial airports, the Sentinel's superior X-Ray technology is smarter than current 

systems because not only can it detect potentially deadly objects, it identifies with 

accuracy what exactly appears. From TNT to plastic bombs, the surveillance system 

alerts security personnel immediately of any suspicious substances. 



"We commend the congressional effort taking place in improving aviation security in 

the wake of the September 11 tragedy, and welcome the opportunity to present our 

security checkpoint system. We are confident that the cost- effectiveness and unique 

dual display technology of the Sentinel will make this surveillance system the most 

viable option for the nation's airports and in turn restore America's confidence in air 

travel," said Eagle President & CEO Paul-Emile Desrosiers. 



The Sentinel is currently utilized in Turkey and is in the pipeline for government 

buildings in India. 

----------------



More radiation may help some breast cancer patients



BOSTON, Nov 7 (Reuters) - When it comes to treating breast cancer with radiation, 

more may be better, according to research published in Thursday's New England 

Journal of Medicine. 



The researchers reported that a "booster dose" of radiation can dramatically lower 

the risk of the cancer reappearing in women aged 40 and under. 



The results from a study of 5,318 women "may influence the treatment of young 

women who have undergone" surgical removal of their tumor and would normally 

only receive one series of radiation treatments, according to the Journal editors. 



After a breast tumor is removed, doctors typically give about 50 units of radiation 

over five weeks to prevent the cancer from reappearing. But the success of the 

treatment is limited. 



To test the impact of additional radiation, Dr. Harry Bartelink of the Netherlands 

Cancer Institute in Amsterdam and his colleagues gave 2,661 of the women an extra 

16 units. 



After five years, the booster dose had little effect on the survival rate for women 41 to 

50. But for younger women, the chance of having the tumor reappear was just 10.2 

percent, compared with 19.5 percent for women who didn't receive the extra 

radiation. 



"We found that an additional dose to the primary tumor area nearly halved the annual 

odds of local recurrence," the researchers concluded. 



The extra radiation seemed to help younger women suggesting that their tumors 

responded more to radiation, although the reason remains unclear, the Dutch team 

said. 



Although the results are "promising," the Journal's editors said, the study "will have to 

be continued with a long follow-up to determine whether the booster dose of radiation 

affects survival without increasing the risk of long-term complications" of radiation 

therapy. 

-------------------



Ontario in running for C$12 bln fusion center

  

TORONTO (Reuters) - Ontario is one of four locations in the running for a C$12 

billion ($7.5 billion) nuclear fusion research center, the province's energy minister 

said Thursday. 



Ontario, Canada's most populous province and home to 12 operating nuclear plants, 

hopes to win the right to build the Iter fusion reactor research and development 

center. The center will study nuclear fusion as a means of generating electricity. 



Representatives from Canada, the European Union, Russia and Japan are currently 

in Toronto to select a host country for the project. 



"These discussions represent a major step toward making the Iter project a reality," 

Jim Wilson, Ontario's energy minister said in a release. "Ontario is recognized as a 

global leader in research, development and innovation, and this makes the province 

a perfect location for the Iter project." 



If Ontario wins the bid it will build the center next to the province's Darlington nuclear 

plant, just east of Toronto. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sandy Perle				Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   

Director, Technical			Extension 2306

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Service	Fax:(714) 668-3149 	           

ICN Pharmaceuticals, Inc.		E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net

ICN Plaza, 3300 Hyland Avenue  	E-Mail: sperle@icnpharm.com   

Costa Mesa, CA 92626                    



Personal Website: http://sandyfl.nukeworker.net

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com





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