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Nuclear Weapons: The Final Pandemic Preventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition

Explore the health implications of Australia's uranium rush through a historical, environmental, and social lens. Learn about radiation exposure, rehabilitation challenges, and the legacy of uranium mining in the Kakadu region. Dive into the dilemmas, impact on indigenous communities, and the complex dynamics of uraniumpolitics.

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Nuclear Weapons: The Final Pandemic Preventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition

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  1. Nuclear Weapons: The Final PandemicPreventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition Health Implications of Australia’s Uranium Rush Bill Williams Medical Association for the Prevention of War, Australia

  2. URANIUM & HEALTH IN AUSTRALIA in the 53rd MILLENIUM • A background to the nuclear age • A little health physics • U-mining in Australia – old + new • Environmental impacts • Radon • Gamma Radiation • Water • Rehabilitation • Environmental Issues • Human health • Big picture Bill Williams, MBBS, blinkybilly@dart.net.au

  3. “these people mixed with ours and all hands danced together”Lt. William Bradley, 29th January 1788 His Excellency informed me that we were to proceed to Botany bay, to bring away two natives as prisoners; and to put to death ten … we were to cut off and bring in the heads of the slain; for which purpose hatchets and bags would be furnished … against this tribe he was determined to strike a decisive blow, in order at once to convince them of our superiority, and to infuse an universal terror…”Watkin Tench, Captain of Marines, Sydney Cove,1790

  4. The fabulous fifties “Most of them were well built, and some of them were outstandingly good specimens… all were well nourished, and their babies were fat…”Dr John Hargrave 1957

  5. 1540 – Agricola: ”pestilential air” • 1789 – Klaproth: “uranium”

  6. Toxic pathways • underground miners: 3 - 20 mSv/a (av. 4.5 mSv/a) • open pit miners: 1 - 5 mSv/a (avg. 1.56 mSv/a) • overall average: 4.4 mSv/a

  7. Radiation exposure sources • Pre-mining background • Mining: ore dust, ventilation shafts • Milling • Tailings • Waste rock • low grade ore piles • Few actual measures of • processing mills • contaminated areas • water management ponds • active mines • Little reporting of variables • Porosity • moisture content • radon diffusion coefficients, • area / grade radon source.” Mudd, G M, 2007. Journal of Environmental Radioactivity

  8. Radon Fluxes / Gamma radiation • RADON • Many deposits have no pre-mining surface radon expression • Some are substantive • poorly studied and reported • Variable flux post- rehabilitation • GAMMA • Some have majorpre-mining gamma signatures, eg. Ranger • Most have no gamma signature • eg. Olympic Dam, Beverley • gamma signatures have probably increased due to operations

  9. “... double risk of lung cancer mortality in underground workers with radon daughter exposures 10-40 WLM, … five-fold increase > 40 WLM” Radon Daughter Exposures at the Radium Hill Uranium Mine and Lung Cancer Rates among Former Workers, 1952-87Woodward et al 2001

  10. Australian Uranium Mining • Phase 1. 1906-32 • for radium • 2. 1950’s-60’s • for nuclear weapons • 3. 1970’s-now • for reactors -------------------- ***Each phase has improved on environmental management BUT the legacy is also growing

  11. Water is Life • All U deposits constrained by water quantity/quality • Degree of impacts variable but always locally very significant • Need for extensive high quality monitoring data – spatially & temporally • Groundwater resources often ignored or undervalued (especially for ISL)

  12. The Rum Jungle Legacy …

  13. Radium Hill 2001 … Rum Jungle 2004 … Ranger 2001 … Yeelirrie 2003 …

  14. REHABILITATIONISSUES • Radon • Gamma Radiation Increases • Erosion • Groundwater Contamination • evaporation ponds • waste rock dump seepage • tailings • open pit lakes • ISL mines • Biological Intrusion

  15. DILEMMAS • ?capacity of ‘sinks’ • ?cycling of radio-nuclides • ?bioaccumulation in different climates • ?‘low-dose, long-term’ exposure • ?long-term monitoring and regulating • ?cumulative radiation impacts ***rehabilitation is more difficult than predicted***

  16. Kakadu Region Social impact Study 1997: “…some of the worst fears of Aboriginal people in the 1970’s have come to pass. Key social indicators like education, health and employment are as bad as any community in Australia.” Ranger Uranium Environment Inquiry, 1977:“…the traditional owners are opposed to the mining (and) do not have confidence that their own view will prevail… They feel that having got so far, the white man is not likely to stop ... We have given careful attention to all that has been put before us by them or on their behalf. In the end, we form the conclusion that their opposition should not be allowed to prevail.” Uraniumpolitics

  17. Yvonne Margarula “Although the uranium mining at Ranger is taking place on Mirrar country, overall we have not truly benefited from the mine. Mining and millions of dollars in royalties have not improved our quality of life”

  18. “Uranium mining has completely upturned our lives… taken our country away from us and destroyed it — billabongs and creeks are gone forever, there are hills of poisonous rock and great holes in the ground with poisonous mud where there used to be nothing but bush. • “Everyone seems to be only concerned with what is happening today or next year, yet no scientist can tell us properly what will happen at the mine site in a hundred years time when they are all gone and no-one cares. • “None of the promises last, but the problems always do.”

  19. Health for all? • Population • Year 12 retention • Prisoners • Unemployment rate • Mortality • Infant • Maternal • 35 – 54 • total • Life expectancy “…the fundamental cause is disempowerment…” Royal Australian College of Physicians - 1997

  20. “Health is more than the absence of disease. It concerns the scope for autonomy and the ability to make choices about the structure and pattern of one’s own life. When the capacity for self determination is eroded, health is compromised. It is too easy for the best of therapeutic intentions to blind us to our patients’ needs for space and stature” HAEMOCHROMATOSIS BMJ 320, May 2000, 1317

  21. BOOMeconomies • “While China has enough uranium resources to support its nuclear weapons program, it would need to import uranium to meet its power demands” • “Russia is not some kind of a rogue state” • and India?

  22. THE BIGGER PICTURE • nuclear weapons • uranium mining • uranium weapons • nuclear power • irresponsible waste management www.icanw.org

  23. 23 MILLENIA: AN “ECOLOGICAL” FOOTPRINT? “Why on earth can’t people in the middle of nowhere have radioactive waste?”   • Radium hill • Rum Jungle • Maralinga • Ranger • Roxby Downs • Beverly • Honeymoon • Pangea • Mukati station • Silex enrichment • GNEP

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