Sunday, August 14, 2016

Propaganda on Low Dose Radiation


Recently there have been a number of mainstream news stories about the findings from the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission Reports (ABCC):
Eric Roston. Radiation Can Kill, but Not as Easily You Think: Studying survivors of America’s atomic attacks on Japan have helped scientists better understand radiation—and how we fear it. Bloomberg, August 11, 2016, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-11/radiation-can-kill-but-not-as-easily-you-think
These articles essentially trivialize risks from exposure to excess ionizing radiation.

One thing that strikes me as significant about the research produced in the 1940s and 1950s by the ABCC is the willingness to acknowledge the significant limitations that constrain generalization of findings beyond the sample population.

For example, the researchers did not have information about exposure DOSES. Dose information had to be reconstructed without firm knowledge of the source terms. That means that dose-effects are fundamentally UNCERTAIN.

Here are a list of some of the ABCC's significant limitations:

1. The research was limited from the beginning because the sample was not "representative" despite its large size because it was composed of SURVIVORS. Survivors may enjoy greater biological resilience to ionizing radiation than the population in general.

2. The research was limited because there were significant cultural incentives for survivors to minimize their symptoms to escape the designation of cultural/biological stigma. Stigmatized survivors had trouble getting jobs and spouses. Hence, there were strong cultural incentives for not reporting full symptoms.

3. The research on reproductive effects was limited by widespread practices of infanticide of imperfect infants and because Japanese women may have resisted their American conquerors' intrusive surveillance of their reproductive cycles (and I mean totally intrusive and potentially humiliating). I sure wouldn't be sharing details of my menstrual cycle or the sadness of a stillborn or severely malformed infant delivered illegally by midwife to any conquering army.
 
4. The research focused disproportionately on cancer until the 1970s and therefore may have attributed radiation-caused deaths to other causes.

5. The research lacked an appropriate control population for evaluating excess risks.

6. The research was shaped by American interests because it was controlled by Americans pretty much entirely until 1975 when the ABCC was dissolved and the Radiation Research Effects institute was established and even this latter institution relies on funding from the US Department of Energy:
The RERF is a nonprofit Japanese foundation binationally managed and supported with equal funding by the governments of Japan, through the MHW, and the United States, through the NAS under contract with the Department of Energy (DOE) (and its predecessors). SOURCE: Itsuzo Shigematsu Greetings: 50 years of Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission–Radiation Effects Research Foundation studies Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1998 May 12; 95(10): 5424–5425. PMCID: PMC33856 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC33856/
7. The research on genetic effects was limited by the available technologies. Gross mutations could be identified but genome sequencing was impossible. Today, new sequencing research reveals that disorders such as autism are correlated with increased rates of de novo micro deletions and repeat sequences (as well as epigenetic effects) in key chromosomes, including 16. These new findings were made possible by more sophisticated research technology that can quickly map and compare entire genomes.
A. Please see my article on chromosome 16 for a discussion of genomic radiosensitivty here: http://majiasblog.blogspot.com/2016/08/chromosome-16-linked-to-human-evolution.html 
 Despite these and other limitations the ABCC research is represented as the GOLD STANDARD and is now being used in a concerted propaganda campaign to deny significant effects from "low dose" radiation exposure.

There was an article in today's Wall Street Journal that basically repeated the same narrative of "few" effects and little excess risk that is circulating across the media.

Here is a study that is being used as a source for allegations that there are few low dose effects:
Bertrand R. Jordan. 2016. The Hiroshima/Nagasaki Survivor Studies: Discrepancies Between Results and General Perception. Genetics August 1, 2016 vol. 203 no. 4 1505-1512; DOI: 10.1http://www.genetics.org/content/203/4/1505 
Since the bombings, which occurred 71 years ago this week, many survivors and their children participated in studies that helped scientists understand the long-term effects of radiation exposure. About 120,000 survivors of the 1945 attacks, and 77,000 of their children, have taken part in the ongoing work since the 1940s. The research was conducted by the U.S. from 1947 to 1975, when Japan set up the Radiation Effects Research Foundation, in partnership with the U.S. This work helped inform the empirical basis for modern radiation exposure standards
Bertrand acknowledges the significant limitations of genetic findings, particularly in relation to trans-generational effects, yet is quite content to move from that uncertainty to the statement that society over-emphasizes risks of radiation.

I believe that research findings generated by Tim Mousseau and Anders Moller (with other colleagues) point to the most insidious and risky effects of protracted exposure to ionizing radiation: reduced head size and increased infertility.

Here is a video presentation by Dr. Mousseau you may find interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKqsbbVBit4

Dr. Mousseau and colleagues do not identify all the mechanisms implicated in observed findings, but do point specifically to the role of enhanced antioxidant production in mitigating against phenotypic effects.

Two problems with the existing radiation dose-effects paradigms (there are other problems but I'm focusing now on these two):

1. Presumes that the biological impacts of all radionuclides are equal, which disregards divergent impacts from biological uptake and chemical toxicity. Thank you CodeShutdown for your very detailed explication of this observation.

2. Presumes that human genome is homogeneous in terms of susceptibility to ionizing radiation. However, that is a false assumption as recent research reveals that chromosome 16 is radio-sensitive and susceptible to re-organization.

Chromosome 16 has been linked to differentiation of human evolution and head size:

Virginia Hughes. May 17, 2012. Fish study links chromosome 16 genes to head size. Spectrum News, https://spectrumnews.org/news/fish-study-links-chromosome-16-genes-to-head-size/

Chromosome 16 has been linked to autism, particularly through role of de novo micro-deletions and sequencing errors  (see my post here)

Chromosome 16 is radio sensitive (see my post here)

Is the pattern clear. Chromosome 16 is radiosensitive, prone to re-organization, which can be adaptive by somehow impacting head size, perhaps allowing for greater neural growth.

Or re-organization can be maladaptive. Too much disorganization produces neurological problems.

Implication: Steadily increasing exposure to ionizing radiation could increase very subtle errors at a rate that is maladaptive, leading to significant transgenerational effects that would be evident in increased neurological problems in the population.

The ABCC researchers understood already that reproductive effects were the most significant risk overall for the health of the population (we are talking about the period of population eugenics here).

As noted above, there were all kinds of incentives for the sample population and for the researchers to minimize effects and the existing research tools were crude by today's standards.

The genetic models were mechanistic, rather than systemic. Life is a dance at every level of analysis and our efforts at coding order are always precarious and can easily be disrupted with potentially catastrophic effects across generations.

In my opinion, contemporary efforts to minimize the long-term effects of ionizing radiation, particularly transgenerational effects, are potentially genocidal, whether intended to be so or not.


11 comments:

  1. Health physics is bunk. Toxicology is the truth. Radionucleides are much more extremely toxic than their analogs. Just miniscule amounts in the body can ablate, destroy, or permanently damage tissue.

    This is also dependent on their affinity for certain tissue. Radioactive iodine is used to kill the thyroid gland in hyperthyroidism. It does so in very low doses. People who undergo this treatment have an unusually high mortality rate and cancer rate later in life. Other tissue is effected. People who have hyperthyroid treated surgically or with nonradioactive drugs do not have those problems.

    Many people treated with radiotherapy and chemo for advanced cancers have bone marrow destruction and immune deficiency in a few years after the treatment. Bone marrow damage and immune deficiency is not as common with chemotherapy and surgery interventions without radiation therapy. I worked in cancer clinics for years. It is true. To talk about nebulous concepts like low dose radiation is pure bull.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Drug Monograph For
      Sodium Iodide I 131


      https://www.drugs.com/pro/sodium-iodide-i-131.html

      Delete
  2. All this depends on a certain kind of human being: smart enough to graduate from college, even to earn a PhD; but not astute enough to take ethics seriously or evidently to have much of what is called conscience. So this person can be assigned almost any task of misleading the public and will perform well so long as his own well being and that of those near to him are not endangered. If challenged he or she will default to its my job, I have financial responsibilities, etc. There always seems to be an abundance of these people strategically located to carry out these assignments and keep all us as well misinformed as is humanly possible!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Your comment raises interesting and important questions about the routinization of "normal science" and the ethics of keeping one's head down.

      Delete
  3. It only takes about 10milliliters of 30 billionths of a gram of radioactive iodine per ml of water to destroy thyroid tissue in the human body. Below is an article that says such. 30 billions of a gram of radioactive iodine 131 dissolved in each milliliter of water of radioactive iodine and 10 mls of that solution will begin destroying the thyroid gland and other tissue in the human body. That amount is what is listed in the following article link I have listed below. Iodine 131 is listed as a drug though it is a deadly radioactive poison. The article uses MBq to track how much radioactive iodine131 will start killing the thyroid gland. They say148MBq which is 30 billionths of a gram or radioactive iodine.

    It is easier to track the amount of radioactive iodine in the body using a gamma spectrometer than a mass spectrometer and their whole concept of radioisotope toxicity is a terrible propaganda too and a big lie. The true and more accurate toxicity of iodine 131 is about 30 billionths of a gram of iodine 131 per ml of water. This amount is not at all visible to the human eye and would be considered low level radiation by these ahole butchers. 30 billionths of a gram of radioactive iodine 131 will active kill your body and it actively admits it here in this monograph of radioactive iodine 131 which these creeps consider a drug.

    https://www.drugs.com/pro/sodium-iodide-i-131.html

    And William there are some honest and San PhDs out here

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Very helpful information and discussion. Thanks!

      Delete
    2. Drug Monograph For Radioisotope
      Sodium Iodide I 131


      https://www.drugs.com/pro/sodium-iodide-i-131.html

      Delete
  4. Dr. Miller does not play their game oelr use their lies for rules. Dr. Busby does not. Dr. Bandzhevsky certainly does not. Even Mousseau errs to their lies to sound balanced and conservative. It is becoming so ridiculous. So much is at stake.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I am reposting this information. I know its hard for lay people to get. I am not talking down to people. So much is clouded by the rules they try use with worthless MBq units that should be converted to mass units. When iodine 131 solutions are made the mass for the amount of iodine 131 added to the water has to be known. They really know the mass units just like people do when cooking.

    It only takes about 10 milliliters of 30 billionths of a gram of radioactive iodine per ml of water to destroy thyroid tissue in the human body. Below is an article that says such. 30 billions of a gram of radioactive iodine 131 dissolved in each milliliter of water of radioactive iodine solution.  10 mls of that radioactive iodine solution will 
    destroy the thyroid gland and other tissue in the human body. That amount is what is listed in the following article link I have listed below. Iodine 131 is listed as a drug though it is a deadly radioactive poison. The article uses MBq to track how much radioactive iodine131 will start killing the thyroid gland. They say148MBq which is 30 billionths of a gram of
    radioactive iodine will do their trick.

    It is easier to track the amount of radioactive iodine in the body using a gamma spectrometer than a mass spectrometer and their whole concept of radioisotope toxicity is a terrible propaganda too and a big lie. The true and more accurate toxicity of iodine 131 is about 30 billionths of a gram of iodine 131 per ml of water. This amount is not at all visible to the human eye and would be considered low level radiation by these ahole butchers. 30 billionths of a gram of radioactive iodine 131 will active kill your body and it actively admits it here in this monograph of radioactive iodine 131 which these creeps consider a drug.


    https://www.drugs.com/pro/sodium-iodide-i-131.ht

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Drug Monograph For Radioisotope
      Sodium Iodide I 131


      https://www.drugs.com/pro/sodium-iodide-i-131.html

      Delete
  6. The American diet is deficient in Iodine compared to the Japanese diet. Expect a lot of thyroid problems because of the 3-11 dosing.

    ReplyDelete

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