We Are Killing Our Own!
The process of using uranium, from the mining of ore to enrichment and fabrication of weapons or fuel rods, always releases radioactive materials into the environment. They accumulate and enter the body from our air, water and food.

The National Cancer Institute  and the Center for Disease Control have estimated that between 11,000 and 212,000  Americans have had thyroid cancer or leukemia from the fallout of our nuclear testing. They believe that about 11,000 of these have died, from radioactive iodine-131 alone. Tens of thousands more have been sickened and many died from radiation exposure in mining, processing,  assembling, and other actions related to these weapons and nuclear fuel.

Several federal programs are now providing compensation to these victims and their families. In 2008 claims are still being evaluated and compensation paid for 22 types of cancer caused by radiation.  RECA, which compensates downwinders, miners, millers and transporters has  approved over 22 thousand cases. EEOICPA, which compensates other nuclear workers employed by the Department of Energy, as of March 2009, had paid compensation to about 76 thousands workers or their surviving families

We will never know exactly how many people have been sickened or killed by low-level nuclear radiation from our weapons efforts and from routine and accidental discharges from nuclear plants, because the effects are varied and often delayed. “The current generation, the one in utero, and all that follow may suffer cancers, immune system damage, leukemias, miscarriages, stillbirths, deformities, and fertility problems... Perhaps the most extreme outcome over time would be simply the wholesale cessation of the ability to reproduce.” -Oser-Brown, Background Briefing on Radioactive Pollution.  

The list of radiation symptoms is similar to those assumed to be caused by chemical pollution of mothers and newborn babies. The statistics are shocking. “Asthma, autism, attention deficit and hyperactivity disorders, childhood brain cancer and acute lymphocytic leukemia have all increased over the past 30 years. Fifteen percent of American couples are infertile. Up to half of all pregnancies end in miscarriage. Three to five percent of babies are born with birth defects. Scientists cannot fully explain these increases, but early life exposure to environmental pollutants is a leading suspect... With an estimated 75,000 chemicals registered for use in the U.S., and an average of seven new chemicals approved each day, many not tested for safety and certainly not tested for their ability to “reprogram” body tissues, the ramifications of this study (of human umbilical cord blood) are enormous”. - Body Burden: The Pollution in Newborns, Environmental Working Group

But even these threats cannot be compared to the results of radiation from  nuclear explosions. From 1946 to 1958 the United States conducted 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands. The total yield of these tests was 108 megatons, the equivalent of more than 7,000 Hiroshima bombs. On November 6, 1995, Lijon Eknilang, a quiet, unassuming woman from the Marshall Islands appeared before  the International Court of Justice in The Hague. She relayed to the 14 officiating judges horrifying testimony about the effects of nuclear testing in the Pacific.

“Women have experienced many reproductive cancers and abnormal births. In privacy, they give birth, not to children as we like to think of them, but to things we could only describe as "octopuses," "apples," "turtles," and other things in our experience.

“The most common birth defects on Rongelap and nearby islands have been "jellyfish" babies. These babies are born with no bones in their bodies and with transparent skin. We can see their brains and hearts beating. The babies usually live for a day or two before they stop breathing. Many women die from abnormal pregnancies, and those who survive give birth to what looks like purple grapes which we quickly hide away and bury.”

Lijon, who has herself had eight miscarriages and no live births, pleaded that the suffering she and other Marshall Islanders had experienced should never be repeated anywhere in the world.  The judges concluded that nuclear weapons are unique in their destructive potential, that their impact could not be contained in time or space, and that there is a universal obligation to abolish such weapons. - From The Human Factor by Alyn Ware, Global Coordinator, Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament.

With chemicals, nuclear weapons and nuclear plants our modern technology is polluting our nation and others to such a degree that we are degrading the human gene pool. If we continue this reckless behavior over time, we may end the human race. 

PS. If you or a friend is having a baby, do your best to protect the mother throughout pregnancy and baby through the first two very sensitive years of  life. Stay away from nuclear and chemical plants for those years. Eat organic foods, if possible, and avoid powerful household chemicals.   

The Environmental Working Group study showed that hundreds of chemicals can get into the mother’s blood and can be delivered to the baby through the umbilical cord. Given reasonable sanitation and a decent diet, your grandparents had a better chance of having a healthy baby than you do in the modern world.