Alice Springs protest against uranium mining
We will quit if uranium mine opens, say doctors Sydney Morning Herald DEBRA JOPSON November 23, 2009
DOCTORS at the only Aboriginal medical service in Alice Springs have threatened to leave if the Federal Government allows a Canadian company to mine uranium near the town.
Protesters will press Northern Territory MPs to stop their support when Parliament sits in Central Australia tomorrow. They say it threatens the town’s future and could set a precedent for other urban centres.
”It’s a big issue … It is unprecedented to have exploration for uranium so close to an established city,” said Isabelle Kirkbride, of Families for a Nuclear Free Future.
Opposition to the mine, 23 kilometres south of the town, at which the Canadian company Cameco has done exploratory drilling, is mounting. Sixteen doctors from the town’s only Aboriginal medical service have written to the federal and Northern Territory governments warning that some will quit if the mine is given the go-ahead.
”They are thinking about the health hazards potentially in contaminated water and radon dust,” said Koen De Decker, a spokesman for the doctors at the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress.
The doctors wrote to the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and other relevant ministers, because he had promoted closing the gap between the health of indigenous and other Australians, Dr De Decker said.
Allowing the mine would mean the loss of crucial senior medical staff who would be difficult to replace, potentially widening the gap, he said…….Jane Clark, a Greens councillor on Alice Springs Town Council, said some saw uranium as an alternative energy source and jobs generator, but locals worried that a mine could pollute the water supply, destroy the growing eco-tourism industry, affect pastoral lands and lead to an exodus. We will quit if uranium mine opens, say doctors
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