Here we go again. -- Radioactive material found in clinic chief's chair

[John Jacobus <crispy_bird@YAHOO.COM>]

>From a CNN alert.  Original at

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/10/21/nuke.materials/index.html

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

Radioactive material found in clinic chief's chair



Police in Florida probing incident as possible theft

and assault



Thursday, October 21, 2004 Posted: 7:14 PM EDT (2314

GMT) 



 

(CNN) -- Police in Florida are investigating the

discovery of three packets of radioactive material in

the chair cushion of a Naples medical clinic

administrator.



Police and state health officials said the

administrator sat on the chair for three or four

hours, but was exposed to only low levels of radiation

and should not suffer any health consequences.



Nevertheless, police are investigating the incident as

a possible theft and assault by a disgruntled

employee.



"That's what it looks like. We have to prove it now;

that's going to be the tough part," said Capt. Bruce

Davidson of Naples Police and Emergency Services.



No arrests have been made, he said. Naples is on the

southwest coast near Fort Myers.



The Naples Diagnostic Imaging Center notified police

last Friday that three packets of Germanium 68 were

missing from a General Electric PET CT Hybrid Imaging

device.



Florida health officials said the radioactive

materials are kept in a small, shielded container in

the machine and are used to calibrate the PET scanner,

a kind of high-tech X-ray device.



Areas in medical facilities that use radioactive

packets are required to be restricted and must be

secured when people are not there, said Bill Passetti,

health physicist for the Florida Department of Health.



Police said there was no sign of a break-in.



Officials said the estimated exposure to the

supervisor was 60 millirem (mR), based on a four-hour

exposure.



The yearly allowable exposure is 100 mR -- or 5,000 mR

for people who work in the medical radiation field,

Passetti said.



"It's well below any accepted limits," Passetti said.

Because the small size of the source, and the fact it

decays over time, "there's really not the potential to

receive a dose that would be considered a health

hazard," he said.



But David Albright of the Institute for Science and

Intelligence Security said the amount is "not a

trivial amount" and could have increased the victim's

chances of getting cancer had it not been discovered.



"It's not guaranteed cancer, but this should be seen

as the equivalent of a physical attack that

jeopardized his safety," he said.



"Even if it was only a 10 percent increase, he should

not have to suffer that. It is a malicious act that

should be interpreted as somebody trying to do you

bodily harm."



The apparent target of the incident, Michael Conrath,

the administrator of the chain clinic, said he does

not know who moved the material, nor would he guess

about the motive.



"I'm trying to let the police do the figuring. My

position is, I don't know and I'm not going to venture

a guess at this point," Conrath said.



As for health consequences, he said, "I'm going to

undergo some medical testing so I can determine that

myself. I don't know if it can be determined with any

certainty."



Asked if he is concerned, he said, "Not terribly. It's

evidently not a tremendous amount of radiation. The

state physicist is very reassuring."







=====

+++++++++++++++++++

"A devotee of Truth may not do anything in deference to convention.  He must always hold himself open to correction, and whenever he discovers himself to be wrong he must confess it at all costs and atone for it."

Monhandas K. Gandhi, in "Autobiography"



-- John

John Jacobus, MS

Certified Health Physicist

e-mail:  crispy_bird@yahoo.com





		

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