Posted on 12/21/2013 4:20:53 AM PST by TigerLikesRooster
Sickened by service: More US sailors claim cancer from helping at Fukushima
By Perry Chiaramonte
Published December 20, 2013
FoxNews.com
When the USS Ronald Reagan responded to the tsunami that struck Japan in March 2011, Navy sailors including Quartermaster Maurice Enis gladly pitched in with rescue efforts.
But months later, while still serving aboard the aircraft carrier, he began to notice strange lumps all over his body. Testing revealed he'd been poisoned with radiation, and his illness would get worse. And his fiance and fellow Reagan quartermaster, Jamie Plym, who also spent several months helping near the Fukushima nuclear power plant, also began to develop frightening symptoms, including chronic bronchitis and hemorrhaging.
“I get so angry. They said as long as the plume was avoided we would be fine."
- Navy sailor Jamie Plym
They and 49 other U.S. Navy members who served aboard the Reagan and sister ship the USS Essex now trace illnesses including thyroid and testicular cancers, leukemia and brain tumors to the time spent aboard the massive ship, whose desalination system pulled in seawater that was used for drinking, cooking and bathing. In a lawsuit filed against Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the plaintiffs claim the power company delayed telling the U.S. Navy the tsunami had caused a nuclear meltdown, sending huge amounts of contaminated water into the sea and, ultimately, into the ship's water system.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
By CBS/AP March 14, 2011, 6: 45 PM
Radiation detected on U.S. warship near Japan
TOKYO - The U.S. Seventh Fleet said Monday it had moved its ships and aircraft away from a quake-stricken Japanese nuclear power plant after discovering low-level radioactive contamination.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/radiation-detected-on-us-warship-near-japan/
2,4,5-T looks like half of a 2,3,7,8-TCDD (dioxin) molecule. Dioxin was a trace contaminant in Agent Orange. There was a lot of research trying to tie Agent Orange exposure to various health outcomes. The only health outcome that was definitively tied to Agent Orange was an increase in the incidence of diabetes; that is a covered disability for exposed veterans. (I am going by pre-2000 data; I have not kept current on dioxin/veteran issues.)
Dioxin exposure causes a variety of effects. But, as those of us trained in toxicology say, the dose makes the poison. The more you are exposed, the higher your chance of adverse health outcome.
Took me 10 times longer to write this comment than the search...
If only 17 personnel had radioactivity on them, and I assume they were decontaminated immediately, then the health effects should be minimal.
This story sounds like sensationalism to me.
Good call there.. my father was diagnosed with Diabetes back around 1990, or so... he had much higher exposure than me.
I am getting symptoms of it too, recently.. not sure how much tests would cost, but the 70/30 insurance here is holding me back :(
it does seem to be jumping the gun, but I wouldn7t doubt that there will be negative outcomes :/
I read what you posted and have included the wording that follows what you quoted from the FB info:
” however, we promptly took the proper precautions and the radioactivity was easily removed by using soap and water. The levels that were detected were very low levels. To put this into perspective, the maximum radiation dose received was equalt to the amount of natural background radiation one would receive in one month from sources such as rocks, soil and the sun.”
I'm extremely skeptical about the account, because a nuke-based carrier like the USS RR should be studded with radiation sensors.
Even if they were decontaminated, that only covers surface skin exposure. New clothes and a nasty scrub down is all it is. It’s the stuff a person ingests and breathes into their lung and enters the body through other openings like tear ducts and skin breaks that we can’t do anything about.
Thus the invention of all manner of positive pressure full body haz-mat suits.
/sarc
Wow. This is worth looking into. But why only 49 sailors? I haven’t heard of any radiation poisoning reports here yet, but Japan is notorious for squelching information release.
Too bad these people served their country instead of being illegal aliens. The Illegals will get better healthcare than those who serve the USA.
PS.....Hey Paul Ryan, KMA.
As HereInTheHeartland points out just above (reply #26), the level of contamination was minimal. Even if they ingested or breathed a small amount, its half-life in the body would be short, because of radioactive decay and the body’s mechanisms for removing environmental contaminants.
A small radiation exposure will not cause cancer. If they weren’t even exposed to enough radiation to cause immediate symptoms (even as mild as a sunburn), it is highly unlikely they were exposed to enough to cause cancer.
I used to work with radioactive substances all the time. They were hot enough to make the Geiger counter scream (so we would turn off the sound), and were dozens to hundreds of times higher than background. I have also had several millicuries of a radioactive isotope injected into my blood for medical imaging. That dose was far higher than the amounts I worked with in the lab! Several years later, still no cancer and no expectation of it.
Naw, can’t be. Too many FReepers said it was a non-event and we needed to back off the all the sensationalism.
There is a lot of information missing here.
What total doses are we talking about?
Was it external dose? Internal? What isotopes?
What kind of ‘cancer’? How many of them smoke?
Point of fact - 25% of people, regardless of environment, will develop ‘cancer’ of some kind in their lifetime. 25%.
Point of fact, for every Rem of exposure, that chance skyrockets and incredible 0.1%.
Over my lifetime, my occupational exposure is nearing 35 Rem. So, statistically speaking, my chance of developing a ‘cancer’ of some kind, is now 28.5%. Big whoop.
We are all, ALL, exposed to radiation dose everyday, from many sources. For someone to get enough to trigger cancer, especially in numbers in a group, the dose would have to be sufficient to make them sick.
Health effects are even less than minimal. I know, I’ve been there.
Radioactive contamination is dirt. It just so happens to give off energy in the form of particles (alpha or beta) or electromagnetic waves (gamma or x-ray).
When the dirt is removed, so is the hazard.
I'm not saying some are not deserving of medical disability, but the benefit seems to drive the increasing numbers.
Yes you can do something about internal contamination. Been there done that.
Your body doesnt care a bit about something being radioactive. It just sees the ‘chemistry’.
Cobalt 60 is particulate. I have carried a small body burden of it from my work. As a particulate, my lungs saw ‘dirt’ and that ‘dirt’ was removed by the same process, over time, as other dirt will be removed. In addition, that contamination is removed by decay. Those two processes together render a ‘biological half life that is shorter than the radiological half life.
I also carried a small burden of Iodine. Yet today I do not.
Total dose from those burdens? between 50 and 100 mRem.
So, hand in hand with this, everyone carries a burden of Carbon 14. Radioactive, with half life about 5700 years, and continuing ingestion every time you eat, you’ll always carry it.
Enjoy bananas? They are radioactive, through the naturally occurring Potassium 40.
Lets not engage in uninformed hysteria.
Inhaled/ingested airborne radiation particles cannot be 'decontaminated'.
Inhaled and ingested particles are removed from the body in much the same way as inhaled and ingested dust, unless the substance is one that is incorporated into tissues. Even in that case, the exposure is still low and the body will get rid of it in a fairly short amount of time anyway. The matter that makes up your body has a high turn-over rate.
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