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RADIATION AND HEALTH SEMINAR


Anyone living near this event and really in need of some entertainment?

Mike ... mcbaker@lanl.gov

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Alec Baldwin
on behalf of
RADIATION AND PUBLIC HEALTH PROJECT (RPHP)
STANDING FOR TRUTH ABOUT RADIATION (STAR)
TOXIC ENVIRONMENTS EFFECT CHILDRENS HEALTH (TEACH)
Cordially invites you to attend
A discussion of the baby teeth study and cancer rates in Toms River, New Jersey
RADIATION AND HEALTH SEMINAR
7 P.M. Tuesday September 21, 1999
Ocean County College
Toms River, New Jersey

PROGRAM
Alec Baldwin, Moderator

Jay Gould, Ph.D. - Ernest Sternglass, Ph.D.
Co-Directors, The Tooth Fairy Project
TOPIC: The baby teeth study past and present.

Janette D. Sherman, M.D., Internal Medicine
TOPIC: Nuclear radiation, chemical carcinogens and breast cancer.

Randy Snell, SEARCH, Long Island, New York
TOPIC: Seeking the truth about cancer clusters.

CONTRIBUTION OF YOUR CHILDREN'S BABY TEETH
AT THIS EVENT IS VITAL TO OUR PROJECT

For information, contact:
Scott Cullen, STAR Foundation, Long Island, (516) 324-0655; or
Julie Brown, Radiation and Public Health Project, Miami, (305) 531-1445.

The Baby Teeth Study. Actor Alec Baldwin sent a letter to 15,000 families in New York and New Jersey, asking them to donate their children's teeth to the "Tooth Fairy Project," a national, scientific study of Americans' exposure to radioactivity. Today, we are inviting you to bring your children’s teeth when you attend this Radiation and Health Seminar, for a public discussion of the baby teeth study and cancer rates in Toms River, New Jersey.

Why Study Baby Teeth? The chemical structure of radioactive strontium (called Sr-90) is similar to calcium, and, when ingested by pregnant women, some of it is transferred to the bones of the fetus. Sr-90 can be measured in the deciduous teeth that children lose between the ages of 5 and 11. Once in the body, Sr-90 continually irradiates cells in the bone and blood-forming element for many years where it can induce bone cancer or leukemia. Babies who ingest breast milk and children who drink cows milk and formula-based milk may also ingest Sr-90, which settles in their bones.
The Federal Government no longer measures Sr-90 uptake in the body. As a result, the Radiation and Public Health Project (RPHP) has launched its own national study of the levels of Sr-90 in baby teeth. This study will measure the Sr-90 levels in teeth. If they are elevated, we will then need to determine whether nuclear power reactors and research reactors at federal laboratories (such as Brookhaven) are affecting our public health and contributing to America’s cancer epidemic.

Study History. Sr-90 is a known carcinogen that did not exist in nature prior to 1945, the dawn of the nuclear age. >From 1954 to 1963, during atmospheric nuclear testing, the amount of Sr-90 from fallout rose rapidly in human bone when tested in adult cadavers in N.Y.C, according to official U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) data. Baby teeth were also examined, and the Sr-90 levels were increasing rapidly. As a result, in 1963 President Kennedy terminated all above ground testing of nuclear weapons through the US/USSR Partial Test Ban Treaty.

To speed ratification of the Partial Test Ban in 1963, the White House asked Dr. Ernest Sternglass, now emeritus professor of radiological physics at the University of Pittsburgh Medical School, to testify before a congressional committee on the effect of low level radiation in inducing childhood cancer. After the termination of above ground nuclear bomb tests, the amount of Sr-90 found in both adults and children's baby teeth declined rapidly. However, 1970 was the last year in which baby teeth were officially tested and the DOE stopped publishing adult Sr-90 levels in 1982. Thus, it is fitting that Dr. Sternglass is now co-directing a second independent study of baby teeth. Currently, the RPHP Baby Teeth Study is focusing on the greater New York/New Jersey metropolitan area to see if Sr-90 levels are once again elevated in baby teeth. Possibly this study will help explain why we are presently witnessing otherwise inexplicable clusters of cancer in children, and increases in breast and prostate cancer in adults.

Co-Sponsors:
COALITION FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE
NEW JERSEY BREAST CANCER COALITION
UNPLUG SALEM

Directions to Fine Arts Building, Ocean Community College, Toms River, New Jersey, (732) 255-0400
From the North or South:
-Take Exit 82 from Garden State Parkway. Proceed east on State Route 37 towards Toms River/Seaside Heights.
-Go about 1 mile (2 traffic lights). Turn at jughandle to Route 549 North (Hopper Avenue).
-Proceed 3 miles to jughandle leading to Ocean County College Campus in Toms River.
-Security Guard in Parking Lot #1 will provide directions to the Seminar in the Fine Arts Building/Theater.
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