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Nuclear Industry Workers Radiated In USA

Comment by Larry Ross, December 11, 2006

This is a companion article to the one showing the difficulties diseased nuclear workers experience when applying for Government assistance and relief as a result of their work in Government-owned nuclear industries.

It shows how workers were seduced by high wages and benefits to work in the nuclear research and weapons industries. It shows that there were few or no warnings and provisions to protect them from deadly radiations.

They were simply hoodwinked into sacrificing their lives and families, as years later they contracted various deadly radiation diseases as a result of this work. It shows how government and industry officials tried to cover up and deny the deadly effects of working in the nuclear weapons industry. 

DU Weapons Have Similar Long-Term Effects

DU munitions - shells, bombs and bullets, are combined with depleted uranium, a by-product of the nuclear industry. As a destroyer, tank-buster and killer, these weapons are much more effective and deadly than conventional munitions. As a result the USA and its allies have used DU weapons in four wars since the first Gulf war in 1991- increasing the DU tonnage used in each war.

But they explode on impact into millions of deadly, microscopic particles that slowly rise into the upper atmosphere, then blow and drift around the planet eventually settling to earth thousands of miles from where they are first used. As they have a half life of 4.5 billion years, they go on killing forever and infecting the gene pool, adults and children of all future generations. They cause many types of cancer, organ failure, other types of lingering killer diseases and horrific genetic mutations of foetuses.

As far as the US and UK Governments are concerned, they pretend DU weapons have no after effects and are perfectly safe for our troops and surrounding population.. The mainly militaristic-political minds which make decisions on these matters place the effectiveness of these weapons above the welfare of their own troops and future generations around the world. That their decisions may someday doom the human species and bring on extinction is not a matter that bothers such people.

They have phoney war cry slogans they can use to justify such decisions. It used to be 'protecting the world from the communists'. Now it is 'to win the war on terrorism'. Other motivating slogans are: 'It's for liberty, freedom and democracy, our values etc'.  Just about any excuse will do, and politicians will approve whatever billions of dollars are needed to implement such decisions.

Readers may ask: Are people enraged by this and don't they care enough to do something about it? That seems to be one of the great mysteries of our time. 

They really don't seem to care much about this risk to themselves, children, grandchildren and future generations. A lemming-like 'just follow the leader to extinction' attitude seems to be an integral part of the human psyche. 

99% of all species of life that have ever evolved on this planet have become extinct.

Just because we have brains, are aware, and can predict the logical deadly results of our actions, does not mean we will act any differently from the dumber species, to postpone these logical results. In our own unique way we are preparing for extinction in many ways - from Global Warming accelerated by rampant population growth and industrialization, to a nuclear weapons arms race with weapons on hair trigger alert. Once released, a fraction of the 27,000 nuclear weapons possessed by nine nuclear weapon states, are enough to kill all life on earth many times over.

DU weapon poisoning will have the same end result, but will take longer - perhaps a hundred years.

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Nuclear Workers: "At That Time You Just Trusted The Government"

By Jordan, Confined Space, November 13, 2006

The Campaign Against Depleted Uranium (CADU) was launched in 1999 to focus specifically on trying to achieve a global ban on the manufacture, testing, and use of depleted uranium weapons.

There are many unanswered questions in the following article. such as:
1)   What were new workers told about the dangers of their workplace?
2)   What % of workers were effected by nuclear-related diseases?
3)   What is the mortality rate among workers suffering from nuclear work diseases?
4)   What occupations at the nuclear plants were most dangerous, and were workers warned about these occupations and given any protective measures.
The Bush Administration is adopting the same denial tactics toward nuclear workers it is using towards soldiers complaining of diseases caused by DU poisoning.

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration repeatedly sought ways to limit payouts to nuclear weapons workers sickened by radiation and toxic material, according to a memo written by congressional investigators and obtained by USA TODAY.
The investigation focuses on a federal program created in 2000 to compensate people with cancers and other illnesses tied to their work at government and contractor-owned facilities involved in Cold War nuclear weapons production. About 98,000 cases have been filed under the program, and the Labor Department has approved compensation in about 24,000 of those cases. However, program records show that not all of those approved claims have been paid. full story