The post on desmutagens has been archived. Not one person ordered burdock, Essiac, or the Hoxsey tonic (that I produce under the name Sundance Extract or Elixir, two different products.) Did the post bomb or are people are in denial or more is needed to convince people of the need to be proactive where radiation exposure is concerned?

Background

The splitting of the atom changed the world irrevocably. As we all know, there was the test of a plutonium bomb at Trinity (Alamagordo) on July 16, 1945. Then, Hiroshima was bombed on August 6th; the weapon was created from uranium-235 and exploded in the air over Hiroshima, about 1900 ft. above the ground. Over 60,000 buildings were destroyed and scientists are still trying to estimate the effects on health, not just on the survivors of Hiroshima but also their descendents.

The second bomb, a plutonium-239 creation exploded 1650 feet above Nagasaki on August 9th. Since this date, no nuclear bombs have been dropped in wars, but over 2000 atmospheric and underground tests were conducted by the U.S., Soviet Union, Great Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, and North Korea. The worst years were 1958 and 1962.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DE5CHLehg14

The first nuclear power plant was commissioned in the 1950s and began operation south of Moscow on June 1, 1954. Since then, over 430 nuclear power plants have been built. In addition there are about 240 reactors used for research and another 180 reactors that power nuclear ships and submarines. The waste products are used to make weapons that disperse depleted uranium wherever used for testing or combat. This is a global nightmare from which the world will not recover for thousands of years, tens of thousands of years.

Though built to specifications suggesting a 40-50 year life expectancy, no reactors have been completely decommissioned. There have been numerous red alerts, two level 7 catastrophes, and several "smaller" incidents. This dangerous technology supplies less than 15% of the world's electricity, and the electricity is produced by genocidal use of nuclear fission materials to boil water that turns turbines. In short, one of the most advanced technologies on the planet is used to boil water. The consequence of using this method for boiling water is that the incidence of birth defects, brain damage, thyroid cancer, heart attacks, cataracts, nosebleeds, leukemia, and countless other forms of cancer has skyrocketed.

Nuclear Power

I take nuclear power seriously. I take it personally that the air I breathe, the food I eat, and the water I drink is a game of roulette in which at any moment, I could ingest a fatal dose of a radionuclide and yet the military — that is supposed to protect us — is a major disseminator of disease-causing radioactivity and untimely death. Nuclear accidents, as we have seen, are not just a risk; they are inevitable because proliferation of a dangerous technology is a fait accompli and the technology and resources to store the waste of a retired plant has not been developed. Instead, the licenses are extended so as to forestall the inevitable need to shut down a plant permanently.

I do not live in fear and am not obsessive, but I understand the risks. I also know that the industry is powerful and that it propagates lies to conceal the dangers. Fallout is random. It depends on the nature of the release, winds, and weather. It claims victims indiscriminately, victims who are denied the truth so that their medical conditions are not diagnosed properly, and the complications are rarely treated correctly. There is simply no way to defend the ethics of an industry that has fouled the Earth for millennia to come and claimed the lives of millions of innocent people, animals, and plants, including the unborn generations from now.

One nuclear accident, like Chernobyl, can pollute half the planet in a matter of days. A disaster of the magnitude of Fukushima could terminate life on the Earth for millions of years to come. There is no room for an ambivalent position. Look at the photos of deformed children and animals, visit a hospital in Ukraine or Iraq or Afghanistan and see for yourself the horror of radiation. Over the years, I have been consulted by ever so many people who had been exposed to potentially fatal doses of radiation. Nearly everyone was oblivious to the risks of exposure to radiation. We have been conditioned to accept the atmospheric tests, fallout, and "routine" medical uses of radiation and to ignore safety precautions.

No dose is safe, but there are doses that can be instantly fatal or gradually fatal. The theory of radiation hormesis has been debunked by most experts. The consensus seems to be that frequent smaller doses of radiation are actually more dangerous that one large dose. This is based in part of studies of survivors of the nuclear bombs dropped on Japan and partly on medical experiments using various levels of ionizing radiation.

The bottom line is that, nuclear proliferation is dangerous. Kids can now build reactors: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/52207962#52207962. Hopefully, they will will also find a way to recycle nuclear waste. . . a way other than selling the weapons grade materials to the military.

Chernobyl

The extent of the damage from Chernobyl has not been calculated. The amount of radioactivity released was equivalent to hundreds Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs. Three billion people live in areas with fallout. At least 50% of the land in Europe is contaminated and 30% of other countries in the Northern Hemisphere. In fact, fallout from Chernobyl was found in Tahiti and Reunion, i.e. the Southern Hemisphere. Prior to the accident, 80% of children in Chernobyl were deemed healthy. Today, the figure is zero to 20%, depending on who is reporting and the proximity to the hardest hit areas. Though thyroid cancer is the main condition discussed, the reality is that nosebleeds — with the potential for malignancy to develop earlier than thyroid cancer — are now an epidemic in Japan. There is also a risk of brain damage during fetal development, genetic mutations that will affect many generations to come, and cardiovascular disease and heart attacks (including among children), and cataracts, also among children as well as adults.

Below is the map of European radiation. Though there are some areas that appear to have less radiation, it is widely believed that reporting is poor in those areas. For example, to protect its nuclear industry and agricultural exports, France might be deliberately denying the extent of radiation. However, farmers in certain parts of the U.K. have been told that their crops and animals will be contaminated for the next 400 years. In reality, that is just the cesium contamination. Uranium and Plutonium will be present more or less forever because the decay rate is much slower. We also know that Turkey, not reported in this chart, got hit very hard.

Fukushima

We are still in the early phases of the Fukushima disaster. It is a much worse problem than Chernobyl. There were experts who recognized this from the first day, but it took months to classify the risks as a level 7 incident. As with the atmospheric tests and propaganda over the safety of nuclear energy, secrecy shrouds the details of Fukushima. It is now apparent that a meltdown did in fact occur and that this was known within hours of the tsunami and explosion. What happens is that hydrogen explosions carry a payload of radionuclides thousands of feet into the air. There can be 200 different radionuclides in a single explosion and these will fall wherever the weather dictates. Therefore, the precise place and date of the fallout will vary enormously. There is nothing at all to suggest an even distribution of radioactivity. Rainfall will increase the risk enormously. This is why some areas of North America had more exposure to Fukushima radiation than many areas of Japan. The wind blew the plumes off the islands of Japan and across the Pacific to other parts of the world. It was not just the Pacific Coast of the U.S. and Canada that were hit. Radiation levels of milk in Vermont also soared. There have also been many spikes in radiation since March 11, 2011, indicating that releases are ongoing.

Exposure

It is very difficult to measure risk. Gamma radiation can be detected with personal dosimeters and relatively simple geiger counters. Beta and alpha radiation requires more sophisticated equipment. Many testing stations were shut down so as to avoid having to report the truth. Longer-term, air, soil, and water contamination will continue to foul the health of all living creatures and impact the food chain. For instance, ruminant animals bioaccumulate radioactivity. This results in contaminated meat and dairy products. The Pacific Ocean is also polluted which means that seafood, including sea vegetables, are no longer safe to eat. Realistically, no one is safe so the art of survival is in personally protective measures. Almost everyone needs to change his or her life style to some extent. For instance, it is folly to be outside in the rain. Likewise, it makes little sense to harvest one's salad ingredients during or immediately following rain. All vegetables need to be washed much more thoroughly. Everyone needs to spend more time indoors, this despite the benefits of natural vitamin D. Choose your time to be outside wisely.

For someone such as myself who lives in the Pacific Northwest where the rains (and thunder) have arrived, this is a great time for reading, for catching up on youtube videos, and for indoor hobbies, including greenhouse activities and sprouting. Growing your own food indoors makes a lot of sense at this time in history. However, everyone also needs to increase the intake of antioxidants. We need to ingest the free radical scavenging foods, like berries and beets, with much more deliberate intent. We need trace minerals. Anyone in areas with high fallout should be taking radioprotective herbs as well . . . including burdock!

Copyright by Ingrid Naiman 2013