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Off [Thread] Topic, but FYI:

Thanks to fanfan for pointing to the dotmet link:

http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=18327

August 14, 2009
“ISOTOPE SHORTAGE MEANS A HEALTH CARE CRISIS”

http://www.dotmed.com/news/story/9900/

“Canadian Isotope Reactor to Be Shuttered Until Next Year”
August 14, 2009
by Lynn Shapiro, Writer

SNIPPET: “Dealing a blow to downstream suppliers and to the medical community alike, the Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) said it will not reopen its National Research Universal (NRU) reactor in Chalk River, Ontario until the first quarter of 2010, as a result of repairs that forced the 52-year-old plant to shut down in May.

Since AECL produces approximately 40 to 50 percent of medical isotopes used in North America, the extended shutdown has suppliers scrambling for new sources.

In July, AECL said that the generator would be back online by late 2009. AECL shuttered the 52-year-old reactor in May, after a leak was found in the reactor’s vessel.

The plant is the only one in North America, and one of five in the world, that makes molybdenum-99, which decays to become technetium-99m, an isotope used in an increasing number of medical imaging tests.

Michael Graham, PhD, SNM’s President, and director of nuclear medicine at the University of Iowa, commenting on the shortage, told DOTmed News in June that “the bottom line is that patients needing nuclear medicine tests may not get them, and may even have to undergo exploratory surgery in some cases.”

He noted radioisotopes are used for such tests as: looking at blood flow in the heart; for bone scans, and for many other studies, like lung scans and uptake of excretion in the kidneys.

Nine Sites Need Repair”