Antinuclear

Australian news, and some related international items

This month

For international news, go to nuclear-news ion for Western Australia’s energy future

http://ifyoulovethisplanet.org/?p=5755    Mary Olson on how women are more vulnerable to atomic radiation


Anti nuclear action below: - more info at Action Australia « Antinuclear and at Event details « Antinuclear     

 EVENTS 

  • May 29 – Melbourne  - Amnesty International panel on weapons and war .
  • May 29 – 30    Melbourne   -   Wind Farms conference
  • May 30 Darwin - expert Panel on Nuclear Waste Dump plan for Muckaty
  • June 2    - Nuclear Abolition Day
  • June 13  - Melbourne  -Lizards Revenge -Shut Roxby Down  
  • June 14  Melbourne  Beyond Zero Emissions ZCA 2020 plan.
  • June 19  - Melbourne Public meeting  US FORCES IN AUSTRALIA: SECURITY OR THREAT?  USforcesflyer-2.pdf

The Nuclear/uranium industry and WOMEN  - theme for May 2012

Deceptive information given to women about breast cancer. Women are repeatedly told about “genetic causes”, about “risks of obesity:. about “diet factors”, about “not having babies”, or “having a baby at a later age” even about “stress” – as causes of breast cancer. The not so subtle message is that it is THEIR FAULT – a problem caused by the individual woman, so – the only preventive actions must be those made by individual women.

The facts are otherwise. The single most proven cause of breast cancer is ionising radiation. After that, other environmental causes exist, amongst the wash of chemicals, and synthetic hormones, that pervade our environment. After that – probably some hereditary susceptability, amongst some women.

Why is this so? One could conclude that breast cancer is a growth industry. There’s money at every point in this sorry cycle – from the radiation from nuclear fuel through to the medical radiation used to detect and treat breast cancer. There is no money clearly involved in shutting down a toxic industry, and preventing millions of breast cancers.

How does ionising radiation cause breast cancer? Ionising radiation comes in several forms. for example, Gamma rays, x-rays, and some sub-atomic particles such as alpha particles and protons In ionising radiation, a tiny electron is released from an atom, and enters a body cell, hitting the DNA in the cell’s nucleus, and damaging it. The damaged DNA sends out ‘wrong’ messages telling the cell to divide in an uncontrolled manner – cancer develops.

“...the time between radiation exposure and breast cancer development is longest in young women and shortest for older women; young children do not show a detectable elevation in breast cancer occurrence for some 35 to 40 years after exposure. Radiation-induced breast cancers appear to occur later in life during the same ages when breast cancer rates, in general, begin to increase. It appears that a single exposure of sufficient dose during early life can increase breast cancer risk even 50 years later...

the relationship between radiation dose and breast cancer risk can be described by a straight line which implies that no matter how low the dose, there is some small risk associated with the exposure.

The risk of subsequent breast cancer from very high doses is lower than that which might be expected from the effects of lower doses. This is because radiation at high doses is an effective killer of cells and dead cells are not able to develop into cancer…..

Young girls are at highest risk …when a young girl is exposed to radiation, she will have menstrual cycles for several decades that might enhance the development of any underlying damage caused by the radiation. There is evidence to suggest that exposure to the immature breast during early development, and around the age of beginning menstruation, carries a higher risk than at other times of a woman’s life.

It is unclear how radiation exposure of the breast during pregnancy affects a woman’s breast cancer risk. However, a recent study of women treated for Hodgkin’s disease concluded that pregnancy might be a time of increased sensitivity of breast tissue to the cancercausing effects of radiation……”

.” John D Boyce, Jr, DSc, Scientific Director,Program on Breast Cancer and Environmental Risk Factors in New York State.. Ionizing Radiation and Breast Cancer Risk


5 Comments »

  1. Imagine a planet where our families were very moderate in size – we wouldn’t be using as much energy in total and could leave some energy for the next generation.

    Comment by L Hunter | September 28, 2009 | Reply

  2. Thank you, L. Hunter.
    I totally agree with you – the goal would be moderation in human numbers, as well as moderation in the way we live, and consume the Earth’s resources.
    I read recently of someone’s suggestion that “the best tool for reducing greenhouse gas emissions is the condom”

    Comment by Christina MacPherson | September 29, 2009 | Reply

  3. I’d have to admit that my views have been influenced by the information put out by the ‘independent’ radio and television broadcasters and by the institutes you have mentioned.
    I feel that I have made a conscious effort to become better educated on the issue of nuclear power but if our public broadcasters and institutes are not providing unbiased information on the issue then where else do I go?
    I personally think the case for nuclear power is strong but I am now wary that I may not have been presented with all the relevant information.

    Comment by MattSmith | January 20, 2010 | Reply

    • Australia’s public broadcasters are not doing such a bad job, by world standards. Of course they find trivia, sensationalism, and overly sentimental topics are more popular than serious matters. And of course, they find it easier to just use the media releases that pour out from industry and government.

      Still, one can find very fair and informative stuff in Australia’s mainstream media – (eg. The Age, Sydney Morning Herald, Courier Mail), just that it’s likely to be on about page 7 of the newspaper, or on TV or radio at an unfriendly time (e.g ABC’s Lateline). Also, journalists aren’t always resourced (or inclined) to spend time at the “coal-face” or rather, the “uranium-face” – some topics just not covered.

      All coupled with Australians, (including journalists’) extraordinary reverence for the opinions of “hard” scientists, (nuclear physicists, like Ziggy Switkowski,) compared to their scepticism about “soft” scientists, ( ecologists, environmental scientists like Mark Diesendorf, or Prof Ian Lowe)

      Comment by Christina MacPherson | January 21, 2010 | Reply

  4. A message we get from the media is that Nuclear power is the only way to provide full-scale baseload power.

    Rarely do Nuclear power proponents mention REDUCING or ELIMINATING the gargantuan full-scale waste of power.

    Examples:

    millions of burning electric lights on bright sunny days, eccentric eclectic electric doors opening for any people/objects passing by and often not coming in, almost countless numbers of devices chewing up electricity in standby power-buy mode, dinosaur toasters and dinosaur ovens run on days that a solar oven could do the job, shop “background” subliminal propaganda programming music and video feeds, hair dryers when extreme water wasteful cotton for towels is unused or discarded in frantic frenzy, “boom box” speaker earthshakers human-attempted earthquakers, electric air conditioning to cool those already overflowing with excessive cold-weather-survival calories, grid iron heaters instead of exercise + no-restrictive-nicotine + no-depressive-alcohol + comfortable clothes in winter.

    The True Cost on my electric bill at home is ONE KILOWATT $0.25 per day, but outside of home, and due to waste society, is probably an order of magnitude (10 times) greater at a minimum.

    “WASTE NOT WANT NOT”

    “To Waste is a Crime.”

    Comment by NoNukes Australia | March 3, 2010 | Reply


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