Atomic Tests During the 1950s Probably Killed Nearly Half a Million Americans

[applegrove]

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2017/12/atomic-tests-during-the-1950s-probably-killed-half-a-million-americans/

By Kevin Drum at Mother Jones

"SNIP........


Here’s the background. After 1949, the US moved most of its atomic bomb testing from the South Pacific to a test facility in Nevada. These were all above-ground tests that generated quite a bit of radioactive fallout, including an especially dangerous isotope of Iodine called Iodine-131. The map below shows the deposits of Iodine-131 from a typical series of tests done in 1953:

.........

As you’d expect, the highest concentrations are immediately downwind of the Nevada Test Site, with a couple of odd hot zones in New Jersey and upstate New York. Luckily, these are mostly areas of sparse population. Unluckily, this doesn’t matter much because it’s not the primary way that Iodine-131 kills people. Most of it ends up being carried by high-altitude winds and then deposited by rainfalls throughout the country. From there it gets into pastureland and then into the milk supply, where it attacks the thyroid. In a new working paper (i.e., still a bit preliminary) Keith Meyers made use of extensive datasets on milk consumption and local death rates and produced a map that shows which areas were most heavily affected:

.......

It turns out that the victims were mostly quite far away from Nevada. A combination of extensive dairy farming and high populations meant that most fatalities were in the upper Midwest extending all the way over to the Eastern seaboard. A rough calculation suggests that the total death toll from testing during the 50s clocked in at about 400,000, far higher than most previous estimates. Children were disproportionately affected because they drink more milk and have smaller thyroids.

But there is, surprisingly, some good news here too. Starting in 1958, and then made permanent by the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, atmospheric testing was halted. Meyers figures that the testing which was moved underground between 1958-1992 probably saved millions of lives. So it could have been a lot worse.




..........SNIP"

[virgogal]

1. The key word is "probably".

This would be very tough to prove .

[ProudLib72]

2. Can Dotard somehow overrule the ban on atmospheric testing?

That is, if he can keep from testing on NK.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

3. Anecdotal: My Dad died of brain cancer after flying scientists to the Pacific islands where testing

was done, in particular Enewetak Atoll. After each test the scientists would fly in to make measurements and set up for the next test. In between the flights he was stationed at Johnston Island, which was downwind of what were euphemistically called the "shots." This was in 1950-52. He was 50 years old when he was diagnosed, and died a year later. It would be hard to prove a direct connection, but inquiring minds want to know...

[applegrove]

4. That is so sad. So young. Vibes.

[Liberal In Texas]

5. Well. Ahem. Consider "The Conqueror" and John Wayne's death

That box is is Geiger counter.

It is said to have crackled so loudly Wayne thought it was broken. Moving it to different clumps of rock and sand produced the same result. The star, by all accounts, shrugged it off. The government had detonated atomic bombs at a test site in Nevada but that was more than a hundred miles away. Officials said the canyons and dunes around St George, a remote, dusty town where the film was shooting, was completely safe.

This is a story about cancer. About how the United States turned swathes of the desert radioactive during the cold war and denied it, bequeathing a medical mystery which to this day haunts Hollywood and rural Mormon communities and raises a thorny question: how much should you trust the government?

Hollywood is set to remember its own cameo in the story with next year’s 50th anniversary of the release of The Conqueror, the film which allegedly killed Wayne plus leading lady Susan Hayward, director Dick Powell and dozens of other cast and crew members.

The exterior scenes were shot near St. George, Utah, 137 miles (220 km) downwind of the United States government's Nevada National Security Site. In 1953, 11 above-ground nuclear weapons tests occurred at the site as part of Operation Upshot–Knothole. The cast and crew spent many difficult weeks at the site, and Hughes later shipped 60 tons of dirt back to Hollywood in order to match the Utah terrain and lend realism to studio re-shoots.[11] The filmmakers knew about the nuclear tests[11] but the federal government assured residents that the tests caused no hazard to public health.[12]

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jun/06/downwinders-nuclear-fallout-hollywood-john-wayne

Director Powell died of cancer in January 1963, seven years after the film's release. Armendáriz was diagnosed with kidney cancer in 1960, and killed himself in June 1963 after he learned his condition had become terminal. Hayward, Wayne, and Moorehead all died of cancer in the 1970s. Hoyt died of lung cancer in 1991. Skeptics point to other factors such as the wide use of tobacco – Wayne and Moorehead in particular were heavy smokers, and Wayne himself believed his lung cancer to have been a result of his six-packs-a-day cigarette habit.[13] The cast and crew totaled 220 people. By the end of 1980, as ascertained by People magazine, 91 of them had developed some form of cancer and 46 had died of the disease. Several of Wayne and Hayward's relatives who visited the set also had cancer scares. Michael Wayne developed skin cancer, his brother Patrick had a benign tumor removed from his breast, and Hayward's son Tim Barker had a benign tumor removed from his mouth.[12][14]

Reportedly, Hughes felt guilty about his decisions regarding the film's production,[11] particularly over the decision to film at a hazardous site. He bought every print of the film for $12 million and kept it out of circulation for many years until Universal Pictures purchased the film from his estate in 1979.[8][15] The Conqueror, along with Ice Station Zebra,[16] is said to be one of the films Hughes watched endlessly during his last years.[17]

If our crazy president decides to start some kind of even limited nuclear war don't worry about quitting smoking or going to the gym.

We would be doomed.

[dembotoz]

6. Father in law had some army assignment involved with these things

Dies of multiple myeloma when in early 40s.

[DFW]

7. My father was at one of those tests

He had cancer twice, prostate at age 70 (beat that) and pancreatic at age 77 (did NOT beat that). He got his first cancer 35 years after the atomic bomb test, so who knows?

Here is a pic he took from MANY miles away:
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[PJMcK]

9. A note about prostate cancer

Recently, I took my 86-year old father to see his GP. Dad wanted me to hear the doctor's comments about his health since he feels his memory is slipping. Thankfully, overall, he's a healthy man. But the doctor said that most men will develop low-grade prostate cancer later in life. Treatments vary on the health and age of the individual patient. In my dad's case, he said, "The cancer will out-live your father!" Accordingly, they monitor his health closely and he has shown no signs of deeper problems.

I don't write this to diminish the importance of cancer screening! Quite the opposite as I firmly believe in preventative medicine. (This is another reason I hate Republicans as they destroy health care for their fellow Americans!) I'm very sorry to hear your father succumbed to pancreatic cancer, DFW. That one's a real killer and like you wrote, "Who knows?"

A larger point that I got from the OP's article is that not only is our country the only one to have used nuclear weapons in warfare, but our government did so many tests within and without the U.S. that carelessly exposed so many people to the deadly effects of the resulting radiation. It is truly shameful.

We can only hope that Trump doesn't pull out his biscuit.

[applegrove]

10. Sorry for your loss. That looks very close.

[DFW]

11. It was many miles away, he said.

Don't forget the immensity of a nuclear detonation. It is probably hard to imagine, but they were probably well over ten miles from Ground Zero.

[applegrove]

12. So tragic. So scary. Vibes. And hopes that the Donald does not go there.

[DFW]

13. Or if he does

That he does it either all by himself, or else hand in hand with Kim Jong Un and Sean Hannity.

[applegrove]

14. No. Don't want to see it ever.

[nuxvomica]

8. I grew up in the upstate NY hot zone

As a child, I didn't like whole milk, preferring powdered milk, which my mom was happy to buy for me because it was cheaper. Maybe I dodged a bullet.

[quaker bill]

15. my Grandfather was one of the troops "witnesses"

He died suddenly in his early 60s of a very aggressive form of leukemia.

[applegrove]

17. Crazy what we humans do to ourselves.

[mountain grammy]

16. My dad was with the occupying troops in Japan

Died of leukemia in 1958.

[applegrove]

18. And you can never know exactly why. So sad.

[L. Coyote]

19. K & R. Where's the monument to those victims of war?