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Nuclear Weapons: The Final Pandemic Preventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition

This study examines the health status of indigenous people living around Jadugoda Uranium Mines. Findings highlight congenital deformities, primary sterility, cancer deaths, and reduced life expectancy due to inadequate safety measures in mining operations. The risks of radiation exposure exceed recommended limits, emphasizing the urgent need for biomarker studies and non-radiological toxicities assessments. Join the cause to protect indigenous communities from uranium radiation hazards.

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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 Status of Indigenous People Around Jadugoda Uranium Mines Shakeel Ur Rahman National Secretary Indian Doctors for Peace and Development

  2. Study on health status of indigenous people living around Jadugoda Uranium mines Dr. Shakeel ur Rahman Dr. Satayajit Kumar Singh INDIAN DOCTORS FOR PEACE AND DEVELOPMENT Supported by Ploughshare Fund

  3. Jadugoda Uranium Mine-fact file • Mining operation going for last 40 years in Jadugoda, Bhatin & Narwapahar mines • UCIL-100% Govt. undertaking • Around 4000 workers and 1000 contractual labourers engaged with mining activities • More uranium mines found – in Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh & Meghalaya. • People’s protest on

  4. Universe of the study Villages around • 3 mines • 3 tailing ponds • 1 ore processing plant

  5. Sample Size • 2118 households & a population of 9116 in study village • 1956 households & a population of 8567 in control villages

  6. Methodology • Structured questionnaire • Focused Group Discussion • Data Analysis on Microsoft excel • P-value and odds ratio calculated to measure statistical significance

  7. Key Findings-Congenital Deformities

  8. Key Findings-Primary Sterility

  9. Key Findings-Cancer Deaths

  10. Key Findings-Life Expectancy

  11. Inadequate Safety Measures • 24th Dec 06-a pipe bursts • Radioactive waste spilled in a creek • No alarm mechanism -Villagers informed authorities • Reaction time-9 hr • Killing riparian life • Waste leaked into Subernekha river • 1986-tailing dam burst & water flowed to villages

  12. Inadequate Safety Measures • Open dumping of mine tailings • Carriage of uranium ore in uncovered dumpers • Till 90’s tailing ponds used as children’s playground, open grazing area • Authorities supplied mine tailings for construction material to villagers • Gross violation of ALARA

  13. Conclusion In uranium mining operation area • Primary sterility is more common • More children with congenital deformities are being born and congenital defect as a cause of death of a child is also high • Cancer as a cause of death is more common • The life expectancy of people is less and more people are dying in their early ages

  14. Estimating the risk • Recommended dose limits for radiation exposure set by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) are 20 milli Sievert/year for workers in the nuclear industry & 1 mSv/year for the general public. • These recommendations set in 1991, and are significantly lower than levels previously thought “safe”. • Study around Jadugoda uranium mine by Hiroaki KOIDE of Kyoto University, Japan in 2004, confirms that the amount of air-gamma dose exceeds 1 (1mSv) per year in the villages and reaches 10 mSv/y around tailing ponds. The strength of pollution in the tailing ponds is 10 to 100 times higher than the place without contamination.

  15. Recommendations • To have risk assessment data • Biomarker studies e.g. chromosomal aberrations • Study on non-radiological toxicities e.g. chemical toxicity on kidney, bone

  16. India’s Navajo Nation • The media in India and USA is going gung-ho on Indo-US nuclear deal. This exhilaration cannot cloak the miseries of thousands of credulous indigenous people suffering the effects of uranium mining in India due to poor technical and management practices in existing mines.

  17. Join hands to shield them from uranium radiation hazards

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