Radiation and HIV/AIDS virus claim

[RADPROJECT@aol.com]

>Date: Wed, 20 Jan 1999 13:10:20 -0600 (CST)
---
>I got to see Dr. Bertell in person in about 1987 where she obliquely
>advanced the concept that AIDS was caused by exposure to radiation.  
>She denied making such a claim when she was asked a direct question 
>after her lecture.
---
>Don Kosloff

<<For an unknown reason Don's comment from Jan. 20) dropped in last night 
(today is Jan. 30) as well as about 5-6 other emails from that week. 
Anyway, I thank for the comment about the denial. It was probably early 
1987 that I got the AIDS/HIV story - I could probably track the source 
if with some difficulty - but my faint memory tells me that the AIDS 
"hypothesis" may have been presented at a talk in Australia (perhaps at 
several occasions).>>

In June 1994, at the annual meeting of the National Association of Atomic
Veterans in Washington, DC, I heard a talk by Dr. Ernest Sternglass where he
made a direct claim, among many others like this, that the HIV virus mutated
somewhere in Africa due to weapon's test fallout, and spread from there around
the world. There was no equivocation to his claims.

I had the unique pleasure of following Dr. Sternglass to the podium after his
rather broad claims including the above, since I had been invited to speak to
this veteran group about the health risks presented by the use of Nasal Radium
Irradiation [NRI] to about 20,000 veterans who had the treatment for pressure
equalization problems, and the failure of government to deal with the issue. I
had published a letter to the editor of the New England Journal of Medicine,
titled "Radium Exposure in US Military Personnel" [Jan. 2, 1992]. This letter
concerned a cohort of at least 5,000 submariners who had NRI on entering the
sub service due to pressure equalization problems that would have disqualified
them from serving. This letter noted the potential health risks of NRI per the
literature, the obligations of government to provide medical notice to vets of
the need for screening under their basic right-to-know, and for the
establishment of a registry of treated military personnel, as part of a
uniquely valuable epidemiological study to document the effect of a controlled
irradiation of this magnitude to a group of men likely totaling about 10,000
individuals. The Navy spokesperson from their Bureau of Medicine and Surgery,
responding in print to my letter upon publication claimed the treated vets
faced trivial health risks from NRI, despite doses to their nasopharynx of
over 2,000 rads [20 Gy], and stated the vets had a right to "privacy" not a
right-to-know. An interesting argument given that the treatment has been found
to result in a RR for brain cancer mortality of 5.3 in a review by the BEIR-V
report, and several other highly statistically significant health effects.

NRI, involved the insertion of sealed 50 mg Ra-226 sources, through each
nostril to the opening of the Eustachian tube for twelve minutes [typical
after 1945, for 3 to 4 treatments] with 36 minutes total duration in a course
of therapy. NRI was used experimentally on about 7,600 vets in WW.II. and a
somewhat larger number from 1946 forward.

Two bills were finally introduced last session to provide medical treatment to
vets treated with NRI [in the US Senate: S. 1822, and House: HR  4367]. A
small part of both bills was passed in October 1998 and included in the VA
Authorizing legislation wherein any vet who had NRI and develops head and neck
cancer will be provided care at a VA hospital or nursing home. This bill would
only apply to fewer than 10,000 veterans, only a fraction of whom might
develop head and neck cancer [the relative risk appears to be about 2 based on
several studies of NRI]. Other health conditions such as thyroid disease [RR
for Grave's disorder = 8.6, p<<0.01] will not be covered under the recently
passed legislation.

After the war, the treatment leaped into private medical practice for use on
young children with middle ear problems [otitis media], a condition very
common in young children. The CDC now estimates that between 570,000 and 2.6
million children in the US received NRI treatments through 1961. The practice
continued into the 1970s especially in areas like Maryland, where the
procedure was so deeply entrenched having been developed at Johns Hopkins, and
so many physicians in Maryland had embraced its use without question due to
their training at Hopkins.

If you want to read more about this issue, check out the website noted below
for the Radium Experiment Assessment Project.

There will also be a feature article about Nasal Radium irradiation in the
Boston Globe Sunday Magazine for Jan. 31, 1999. You can access it after
publication tomorrow, by going to:

http://www.boston.com/globe/magazine

I don't know the exact title of this upcoming feature article, but the B.
Globe Magazine generally has only two major stories per issue.

Regards,

Stewart Farber, MS Public Health
Director - Radium Experiment Assessment Project [REAP]
19 Stuart St.
Pawtucket, RI 02860

Phone/FAX: (401) 727-4947  E-mail: radproject@usa.net
            Web address: http://www.delphi.com/carsreap


The Radium Experiment Assessment Project [REAP] is a project 
of the Center for Atomic Radiation Studies, Inc., a not-for-profit 501(c)(3)
organization. Contributions are tax deductible to the extent permitted by law.

PS: Sorry for the prior blank transmission. I clicked on something too early
and sent it on its way


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