Re: Radioactive gems circulating in Asia?

["Dr. Marvin Goldman" <mgoldman@ucdavis.edu>]

>The following news story was on the radio and in the paper this morning.
>I got the text from:
>http://www.seattletimes.com/extra/browse/html97/gems_111197.html
>
>Bruce Pickett
>The Boeing Company
>Seattle, WA
>bruce.d.pickett@boeing.com
>-----------------------------------------------
>Copyright (c) 1997 The Seattle Times Company
>
>Tuesday, Nov. 11, 1997
>
>Radioactive gems circulating in Asia?
>
>by James Mclean
>Reuters
>
>BANGKOK - Hundreds of dangerously radioactive gemstones are
>circulating in Asian markets, and some have found their way into
>finished jewelry, Bangkok gemologists believe.
>
>Tests conducted by radiologists in the Thai capital showed radiation
>levels in some stones were more than 50 times the U.S. safety limit
>and could cause health problems, including cancer.
>
>"It is most likely that the stone has been bombarded with neutrons in a
>nuclear reactor," said Bangkok's Center for Gemstone Testing.
>
>The concerns center on batches of a popular semi-precious stone
>called a "cat's eye" which are believed to have been irradiated to
>change their color from yellow, when they are worth a few hundred
>U.S. dollars per carat, to a chocolate hue priced at thousands of
>dollars per carat.
>
>A 30-carat radioactive cat's eye set with diamonds in a finished ring
>was discovered recently at a jewelry fair in Hong Kong, jewelry
>executives said.
>
>"When it was placed in front of a Geiger counter (radiation detector)
>we literally leaped back. The machine was just screeching every time
>the ring went near it," said Jon McDonald, an editor at a local
>jewelry-media firm.
>
>Tests recently conducted by laboratories in Bangkok on a 3.5-carat
>stone showed radioactivity levels greater than 52 nanocuries per gram
>(nCi/g). The U.S. safety limit is 1.0 nCi/g, and the legal limit in Asia
>is
>2.0 nCi/g, gemologists said.
>
>"This is dangerous; it could make your skin cancerous and destroy
>white blood cells," said Bandhong Wangcharoenroong, director of the
>radiation measurement division at Thailand's Office of Atomic Energy
>for Peace.
>
>Several hundred carats of the stones were thought to be circulating in
>Bangkok, but the problem was region-wide, said Ken Scarratt,
>director of the Center for Gemstone Testing. "The biggest problem is
>in places like Indonesia and Japan. In Indonesia a gem lab there has
>seen hundreds of these stones coming through," he said.
>
>Tests suggested the stones would not be safe until the turn of the
>century and should be kept in lead containers until that time, Scarratt
>said.
>
>Dealers believe low-quality cat's eyes from Orissa in India were being
>exported to Indonesia for irradiation and sold from there.
>
>But an Indonesian jewelry-industry official in Jakarta said he doubted
>his country was the source of the radioactive gems. "Indonesia buys a
>lot of gemstones from Burma, Thailand and India but to my
>knowledge there are no labs here to treat gemstones," said the official,
>who declined to be identified.
>
>"There are laboratories to test gemstone quality, but there are no labs
>to treat gemstones," he told Reuters.
>
>He said irradiating gemstones was done elsewhere to increase their
>value and one of his colleagues had discovered such stones in
>Thailand a couple of years ago.
Sounds like the makings of a new Clancey novel, and can RADSAFE get the
film rights?  Wonder what doses the gem zappers/distributors got.
mgoldman@ucdavis.edu