Where has all the radioactivity gone?

[BLHamrick@AOL.COM]

In a message dated 03/29/2002 3:40:38 PM Pacific Standard Time, g2v13a@SWBELL.NET writes:



> Where should we get these radiopharm's from?
>
> The current sources are reactors and cyclotrons.


And, although I often see proposed bills (such as in California) which attempt in one way or another to "exempt" medical use, they are rarely well-crafted enough to serve the apparent intent.  For example, they may exempt "medical facilities," but fail to mention radiopharmacies, or medical source manufacturers.  I'm not sure where the "anti's" think iodine-125 seeds come from for the treatment of prostate cancer, throat cancers, and melanomas of the eye, but it's not from the medical-institution-fairy.


As pointed out above, the origination of medically usefule isotopes is either in a reactor or cyclotron.  While there are some "anti" proponents of moving toward cyclotron technology only, they generally base their arguments on the fact that the isotopes produced are all very short-lived.  While that may be true for the PET pharmaceuticals intentionally produced, it is simply not true for the inadvertent activation products in the walls, soils, rebar, and cyclotron itself.


Finally, I have seen legislation (very recently, I might add) that proposes to exempt certain short-lived medical isotopes, but control everything else at any level "above background."  It might behoove these folks to recognize that there are long-lived contaminants "above background" in most radiopharmaceuticals, including, if not particularly, those produced by cyclotrons (and, I ain't just talking about the obvious Tc-99 product of Tc-99m).


If one is not willing to make the effort to understand the technical nuances in a field, then one really shouldn't be trying to write law to control it, at least not without substantial input from appropriately educated and experienced experts.


Once again, that's just my personal, never humble, opinion.


Barbara