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

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

POSTED BY: SECOND
UPDATED: Saturday, December 23, 2017 20:07
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Friday, December 22, 2017 11:14 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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

You probably need something to cheer you up after the tax follies of this week. So how about a scholarly examination of how many Americans were killed by atomic bomb testing in the 50s? I think that should do the trick.

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. 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 400-700,000, 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 12-24 million American lives. So it could have been a lot worse.

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Friday, December 22, 2017 11:48 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

Let's blow something up to intimidate the Soviet Union! What could possibly go wrong?

Radioactive Milk is what: US nuclear tests killed far more civilians than we knew

https://qz.com/1163140

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Friday, December 22, 2017 2:12 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr

Soundz low to me.

Canser iz big biz. There are commercialz on TV all day every day for treatment sentrz and lawyerz promising big settlments.

Maybe its just my perseption, but it seemz like more peepl are being diagnosed with sum form uv canser than ever before.

----------------------------
DUZ XaT SEM RiT TQ YQ? - Jubal Early

http://www.7532020.com

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Friday, December 22, 2017 2:43 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

Quote:
Originally posted by JO753:
Soundz low to me.

Oh, you got that right. The paper's conclusion agrees with you:

The evidence presented in this paper reveals that the health cost of domestic nuclear testing is both larger and more expansive than previously thought. The mortality estimates may understate the magnitude of the true number of deaths attributable to nuclear testing and the magnitude of the health costs of this polluting defense policy. It is plausible that these estimates are lower bounds of the true health effects. Migration and measurement error in treatment introduces attenuation bias, and the health effects of radiation exposure may only appear later in life for many individuals. Millions of people who grew up during the testing period are now retiring from the labor force and are drawing upon Medicare and other government provided services. Nuclear testing may have made an entire generation of people less healthy and thus increased the cost of providing health care well into the present. This paper reveals that there are more casualties of the Cold War than previously thought, but the extent to which society still bears the costs of the Cold War remains an open question.

https://qzprod.files.wordpress.com/2017/12/6043f-meyers-fallout-mortal
ity-website.pdf

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Saturday, December 23, 2017 8:07 PM

OONJERAH

Being fairly olde, I may be more susceptible to communicable diseases as well as
those of old age. Nevertheless, I stopped going to Drs about 7 years ago.
It was because my heart Dr. plotted for me to get stents without my permission.
I avoided that, 'cause I wasn't as doped up as they'd intended.

Since I don't trust the bastards anymore, when I finally do become ill, what will I do?

When I was a kid, Mom thought doctors were heroic, could do no wrong.
But morally, I say they are individuals like the rest of us.

... oooOO}{OOooo ...

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