Monday, October 26, 2009

Cold War Remnant: Cancer for Baby Boomers

"Even with a half-century’s hindsight, the
U.S. government’s willingness to risk the
health of the nation’s children seems somewhere
between unfathomable and unconscionable.
Between 1951 and 1962, the Atomic Energy
Commission detonated more than 100
nuclear bombs in the atmosphere over its
Nevada Test Site, just 65 miles from Las
Vegas. The radioactive fallout menaced not
only the ranchers and the miners unlucky
enough to live in that remote area of southern
Nevada, but — as a new study unveiled
Tuesday demonstrated — untold millions
of unsuspecting Americans as well.

The winds carried Strontium-90, Iodine-
129 and other lethal particles across a
broad swath of the country. Infants who
were bottle-fed, which was then considered
the modern approach, were particularly
vulnerable to the Strontium-90 that ended
up in cows’ milk."


(Read more...)