From: dave@ratmandu.esd.sgi.com (dave "who can do? ratmandu!" ratcliffe)
Subject: The BEIR V Report in "Deadly Deceit, Low-Level Rad/High-Level Coverup"
Summary: 1990 BEIR Report substanstiates findings of "Deadly Deceit"'s authors
Keywords: Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.
Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 14:06:39 GMT



 the following review of the National Academy of Science's Committee on the
 Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation, BEIR V report, issued in 1990,
 inside of the Appendixes of "Deadly Deceit," indicates there may actually be 
 some movement inside the BEIR Committees towards an acknowledgement of the
 true costs of almost fifty years of the continued development of nuclear
 technology.  first some excerpts, then an observation about the possible
 changing point-of-view being presented by the committees that publish the 
 BEIR reports:


    . . .  The report . . . pinpoint[s] what we believe is the basic 
    problem: "the discrepancies between estimates based on high-dose studies
    and observations made in some low-dose studies could . . . arise from 
    problems of extrapolation."[218]  These extrapolations may have led to 
    underestimates at low doses, because they assumed the dose-response 
    curve was linear or quadratic, rather than supralinear (which rises 
    rapidly at low doses and levels off at high doses). . . .  As a result 
    of risk estimates based on mistaken extrapolations, government standards
    for environmental releases of radioactivity from nuclear facilities may 
    be 100 to 1000 times too high, especially for infants. . . . 
       These findings, based on the follow-up of some 16 million women over
    as long a period as 36 years, support the conclusion of Dr. Stewart and
    her colleagues that natural and man-made background radiation may
    account for the majority of childhood cancers and leukemias in our
    society today.  A total background dose (including cosmic rays and
    internal sources within the body) of only 150 millirads before birth
    appears to double the risk of a child dying of cancer or leukemia
    before age 15.  This represents an increased risk of 0.6 percent per
    millirad, which is many thousands times greater than the 0.8 percent
    increased risk per 10,000 millirads derived by BEIR V for adults based
    on exposure to high-energy gamma rays at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[227] . . .
       According to BEIR V, a comprehensive survey of cancer incidence and
    mortality near nuclear installations in England--carried out by the
    United Kingdom Office of Population Censuses and Surveys--found
    "significant overall excesses of cancer mortality due to lymphoid,
    leukemia and brain cancer in children and due to liver cancer, lung
    cancer, Hodgkin's disease, all lymphomas, unspecified brain and central
    nervous system tumors, and all malignancies in adults."[233]  It is
    interesting to note that the study found cancer rates did not diminish
    consistently with distance from the plants.  This finding could be
    explained by our hypothesis that contaminated milk and food produced in
    rural areas near nuclear plants is frequently transported to the large
    urban centers, so that there often is not a simple correlation with
    proximity.  Furthermore, a logarithmic type of dose-response, which is
    quite flat above the smallest doses, would tend to mask any dependence
    upon distance. . . .
       Thus, the BEIR V report's many citations of rising rates of mental
    retardation, leukemia, and mortality associated with nuclear plants and
    bomb-test fallout further support our hypothesis that the risks from
    small doses of environmental radiation have been severely
    underestimated by government agencies.  We suggest in Chapter Six that
    this tendency may even have led to outright falsification of data.



 it is interesting to note in Dr. Rosalie Bertell's critique of ICRP structure
 and membership included in this series, her assessment of the BEIR Committees:

          The BEIR Committees are heavily staffed with personnel from
          U.S.  Government  nuclear research laboratories such as Oak
          Ridge and Brookhaven, and with researchers from the  atomic
          bomb  research centers at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  There is
          a greater breadth of expertise on the BEIR Committees  than
          on  ICRP  and  much  more  internal  dissent.  However, the
          Committee assumes an  adversarial  rather  than  scientific
          role.    For   example,  BEIR  III  includes  critiques  of
          scientists who have challenged  its  risk  factors  without
          providing  for  a  response  by  these  scientists to their
          critique.

          The atomic bomb research has dominated  the  BEIR  reports,
          and  the  health  effects of exposure to ionizing radiation
          are seen as a national security subject in the  U.S.,  both
          because  they  describe  the  effects  of  atomic bombs and
          because they affect the public's  willingness  to  produce,
          test, store and accept the waste from the military program.

           . . .  Until publicly forced to do so, these agencies have
          taken    little    or    no responsibility  for  the  human  
	  consequences and  suffering caused by these misguided human 
	  experiments.   These  human experiments were carried out at
	  or through  the  Oak  Ridge  Associated  Universities,  the
	  Argonne  National   Nuclear Laboratory  together  with  the
	  University of Chicago,  the  Washington  and  Oregon  State
	  Prisons, Columbia University and the Montefiore Hospital in
	  New  York,  the  Massachusetts  Institute of Technology and 
	  Massachusetts General  Hospital in Boston.  In addition  to
	  this,  there  were area experiments with radioactive iodine
	  deliberately  released  to  the  environment  from the U.S.
	  Hanford  Reservation  and the U.S. National Reactor Testing 
	  Station  at  Idaho  Falls.  Some  of  the radiation related 
	  findings are still classified as secret in the U.S.

 Dr. Bertell notes that while "There is a greater breadth of expertise on the 
 BEIR Committee than on ICRP and much more internal dissent," nevertheless,
 "Until publicly forced to do so, these agencies have taken little or no 
 responsibility for the human consequences and suffering caused by these 
 misguided human experiments."  If BEIR V is any indication, it is possible
 the factual evidence is becoming so preponderant concerning the true costs
 and health effects of low-level ionizing radiation, that even such an
 organization of official repute as the National Academy of Science's Committee
 on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation may be showing signs of 
 cracking under the weight of it's almost fifty-year-old participation in
 suppressing research and information indicating that nuclear technology is
 causing irreparable damage to the life-support system--the air, the water, the
 food, the land--and at the same time, damaging the gene pool or the children.
 In other words, producing succeeding generations of human beings--as well as 
 ALL life on Mother Earth--physically less able to cope and at the same time
 giving them more to cope with in an increasingly toxic environment.  This is
 a death process, for which, in the *long-term*, we are killing ourselves as a
 species.

 
 
 the following is taken from the Appendix of the revised and updated softcover
 1991 edition of "Deadly Deceit, Low-Level Radiation, High-Level Coverup" by 
 Dr. Jay Gould and Benjamin A. Goldman with Kate Millpointer, published by 
 Four Walls Eight Windows, New York, and reprinted here with the permission of
 Dr. Gould.
  ___________________________________________________________________________


                               The BEIR V Report


    Just before this book went to print, the National Academy of Science's
    Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (BEIR)
    released a new report that bears directly on our principal
    findings.[215]  The Committee's extensive review of the latest
    scientific literature, known as the "BEIR V" report, concludes that
    cancer and leukemia risks for the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
    have been underestimated by factors of three to four, due to faulty
    dose estimates and insufficient follow-up study of the survivors.
    Moreover, BEIR V found that risks from diagnostic X-rays may have been
    underestimated by an additional factor of two, because they were based
    on extrapolations of exposures to short bursts of high-energy gamma
    rays from bomb explosions, which were found to be less effective
    biologically than X-rays.[216]
       The BEIR V report cites numerous studies showing increases in
    leukemia and cancer rates from very low doses of fallout from weapons
    testing and nuclear plant accidents.  As with diagnostic X-rays, these
    increases were far above those expected from the studies of bomb
    survivors, further supporting the principal findings of our book.  The
    report suggests that, "although such studies do not provide sufficient
    statistical precision to contribute to the risk estimation procedure
    per se, {they do raise legitimate questions about the validity of the
    currently accepted estimates} [emphasis added]."[217]
       The report goes on to pinpoint what we believe is the basic problem:
    "the discrepancies between estimates based on high-dose studies and
    observations made in some low-dose studies could . . . arise from
    problems of extrapolation."[218]  These extrapolations may have led to
    underestimates at low doses, because they assumed the dose-response
    curve was linear or quadratic, rather than supralinear (which rises
    rapidly at low doses and levels off at high doses).
       A supralinear dose-response curve is suggested by the so-called
    "Petkau effect" (discussed in our methodological appendix), which
    involves tumor promotion from free radicals created by repeated
    exposures at low dose-rates.  Indeed, the BEIR V report explicitly
    refers to the tumor-promoting effect of free radicals observed in
    laboratory studies of cells, and illustrates how such promoting agents
    can dramatically change the shape of the dose-response curves so as to
    increase the effect of carcinogens at the lowest doses.[219]  As a
    result of risk estimates based on mistaken extrapolations, government
    standards for environmental releases of radioactivity from nuclear
    facilities may be 100 to 1000 times too high, especially for infants.
       The BEIR V findings of greatest concern for the long run may be the
    effects of low radiation doses on the physical and mental development
    of the newborn.  Detailed studies of infants who were {in utero} at the
    time of the bomb detonations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki found a much
    greater risk of severe mental retardation than previously
    believed.[220]  Moreover, the new studies found that intelligence test
    scores and school performance of children exposed {in utero} were also
    significantly affected in relation to the degree of exposure.[221]  New
    studies of children whose heads and necks were irradiated for
    therapeutic purposes in their early childhood also found behavioral
    impairment as well as poorer school performance.  For example, a study
    by an Israeli group found irradiated children scored poorly on
    aptitude, intelligence, and psychological tests, often dropped out of
    school or entered mental hospitals for neuro-psychiatric diseases, and
    had higher rates of mental retardation.[222]
       These results, combined with the new findings of errors in
    dosimetry, the differences in types of radiation and exposure, and the
    erroneous assumptions about the shape of the dose-response curve,
    independently support the correlations of fallout levels with SAT
    scores in the U.S., which, along with their grave implications for
    attendant social problems, are discussed in Chapter Eleven.  The new
    evidence led to the following recommendation in the BEIR V report:

       {The dose-dependent increase in the frequency of mental
       retardation in prenatally irradiated A-bomb survivors implies the
       possibility of higher risks to the embryo from low-level
       radiation than have been suspected heretofore.  It is important
       that appropriate epidemiological and experimental research be
       conducted to advance our understanding of these effects and their
       dose-effect relationship.[223]}

    As well as the need for more research, these findings indicate the need
    to take immediate steps to reduce considerably the permissible levels
    of radioactive isotopes in our milk and diet.
       The Delaney Clause of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act prohibits any
    addition to food of substances known to be carcinogenic in man or
    animal.[224]  Yet new studies reviewed in the BEIR V report indicate
    that radioactive isotopes added to milk and other food by bomb-test
    fallout are associated with significant increases in leukemia rates in
    the U.S.  BEIR V describes the findings as follows:

       {Leukemia death rates (for all ages and all cell-types) peaked in
       the decade 1960-1969 and were consistently highest in states with
       high strontium-90 levels in the diet, milk, and bones (based on
       surveys by the Public Health Services from 1957 to 1970) and
       lowest in states with low strontium-90 levels.[225]}

    These effects were observed despite the fact that dose rates were well
    below allowable limits:  the estimated total dose over many years of
    weapons testing was only 400 millirads, compared with a legally
    permitted maximum individual dose of 500 millirads per year.
       The BEIR V report also cites a new large-scale British study by Dr.
    Alice Stewart and her associates demonstrating that extremely small
    radiation doses in the environment are capable of affecting the future
    health of individuals exposed as fetuses.[226]  Dr. Stewart had
    established with earlier research that childhood cancers and leukemias
    were associated with exposures to diagnostic X-rays during pregnancy.
    In the latest study, her group discovered a direct correlation of
    childhood cancers and leukemias with background levels of gamma
    radiation from natural and man-made sources in England, Wales and
    Scotland.  The cumulative outdoor doses due to this source during fetal
    life varied between only ten and 40 millirads, with an average of 22
    millirads.  After correcting for a series of socioeconomic, medical and
    demographic factors, the researchers found that the effect on fetuses
    of radioactivity on the ground was more than three times greater than
    that of diagnostic X-rays.
       These findings, based on the follow-up of some 16 million women over
    as long a period as 36 years, support the conclusion of Dr. Stewart and
    her colleagues that natural and man-made background radiation may
    account for the majority of childhood cancers and leukemias in our
    society today.  A total background dose (including cosmic rays and
    internal sources within the body) of only 150 millirads before birth
    appears to double the risk of a child dying of cancer or leukemia
    before age 15.  This represents an increased risk of 0.6 percent per
    millirad, which is many thousands times greater than the 0.8 percent
    increased risk per 10,000 millirads derived by BEIR V for adults based
    on exposure to high-energy gamma rays at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[227]
       Dr. Stewart's findings would strongly indicate that the standards
    set for exposure of adults to low-level radiation may be thousands of
    times too high for the developing fetus.  Her work is based on the
    Oxford Survey of Childhood Cancers which covers 22,351 cases, a far
    larger universe than that of the Hiroshima-Nagasaki survivors.
    Moreover, it uses far superior dosimetry:  National Radiological
    Protection Board measurements of background gamma radiation levels
    produced by radioactivity on the ground for every ten-kilometer square
    area in England, Wales and Scotland.  It is unfortunate that BEIR V did
    not quantify this enormous difference between the sensitivity of the
    developing fetus to low-level radiation and that of the adult.
       Numerous other studies, many from England, have examined the effects
    of low-level man-made environmental radiation on children.[225]  One
    study examined excess leukemia rates among children near the Windscale
    (Sellafield) nuclear reactors and reprocessing plant on the Irish Sea,
    near the Scottish border.[229]  Another examined children under five
    years old living within ten kilometers of one or more British nuclear
    plants, and another looked at childhood leukemia cases around four
    nuclear facilities in western Scotland.[230]  Using an automated
    technique for locating unusual clusters of cancers, one study
    identified Seascale, which is near Sellafield, as an area in the
    Northern and Northwestern regions of England with unusually high
    mortality from acute lymphoblastic leukemia in children.[231]
       The BEIR V report cites many other recent epidemiological studies
    that also support our findings of much greater-than-expected effects
    from environmental radiation on adults as well as infants and children.
    It cites studies of rises in cancer and leukemia among the residents
    downwind from the Nevada Test Site, studies of participants in American
    and British nuclear weapons tests, where again leukemia deaths were
    found to have occurred at rates significantly above those normally
    expected, despite the very small external gamma radiation doses.[232]
       According to BEIR V, a comprehensive survey of cancer incidence and
    mortality near nuclear installations in England--carried out by the
    United Kingdom Office of Population Censuses and Surveys--found
    "significant overall excesses of cancer mortality due to lymphoid,
    leukemia and brain cancer in children and due to liver cancer, lung
    cancer, Hodgkin's disease, all lymphomas, unspecified brain and central
    nervous system tumors, and all malignancies in adults."[233]  It is
    interesting to note that the study found cancer rates did not diminish
    consistently with distance from the plants.  This finding could be
    explained by our hypothesis that contaminated milk and food produced in
    rural areas near nuclear plants is frequently transported to the large
    urban centers, so that there often is not a simple correlation with
    proximity.  Furthermore, a logarithmic type of dose-response, which is
    quite flat above the smallest doses, would tend to mask any dependence
    upon distance.
       The BEIR V report also cites a study of excess leukemia and other
    cancers of the blood-forming system in five towns near the Pilgrim
    nuclear reactor in Massachusetts.[234]  This reactor had a series of
    large releases, culminating in 1982 to 1983, due to a faulty
    radioactive waste treatment system.  Although these were among the
    worst releases in the history of U.S. commercial nuclear power, their
    seriousness was kept secret at the time.  Sharp rises in Massachusetts'
    monthly infant mortality rates during the summer of 1982 led to our
    discovery of large spurious "negative" readings of radioactivity in New
    England's milk (described in Chapter Six and illustrated in Figure 6-7).
       Thus, the BEIR V report's many citations of rising rates of mental
    retardation, leukemia, and mortality associated with nuclear plants and
    bomb-test fallout further support our hypothesis that the risks from
    small doses of environmental radiation have been severely
    underestimated by government agencies.  We suggest in Chapter Six that
    this tendency may even have led to outright falsification of data.



  [215] Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation, {Health
        Effects of Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiation: BEIR V,}
        Washington, DC:  National Academy Press, 1990.
 
  [216] {Ibid.,} p. 218.
 
  [217] {Ibid.,} p. 47.
 
  [218] {Ibid.}
 
  [219] {Ibid.,} p. 139 and Figures 3-4 and 3-5 on p. 146.  Supporting
        references include:  E. S. Copeland, editor, A National Institutes
        of Health Workshop Report, "Free radicals in promotion--a chemical
        pathology study section workshop," {Cancer Research,} Vol. 43,
        1983, pp. 5631-5637;  S. M. Fisher and L. M. Adams, "Suppression
        of tumor-promoter induced chemiluminescence in mouse epidermal
        cells by several inhibitors of arachinoic acid metabolism,"
        {Cancer Research,} Vol. 45, 1985, pp. 3130-3136;  B. 0. Goldstein,
        G. Witz, M. Amoruso, D. S. Stone, and W. Troll, "Morphonuclear
        leukocyte superoxide anion radical (02) production by tumor
        promoters," {Cancer Letters,} Vol. 11, 1981, pp. 257-262;  D. R.
        Jaffe, J. F. Williamson, G. T. Bowden, "Ionizing radiation
        enhances malignant progression of mouse skin tumors,"
        {Carcinogenesis,} Vol. 8,1987, pp. 1753-1755;  J. B. Little and
        J. R. Williams, "Effects of ionizing radiation on mammalian
        cells," in S. R. Geiger, H. L. Falk, S. D. Murphy, and P. H. K.
        Lee, editors, {Handbook of Physiology,} Bethesda, MD:  American
        Physiological Society, 1977, pp. 127-155;  J. H. Marx, "Do tumor
        promoters affect DNA after all?" {Science,} Vol. 219, 1983,
        pp. 158-159;  and J. E. Trosko, L. P. Yotti, S. T. Warren,
        G. Tsushimoto, and C. C. Chang, "Inhibition of cell-cell
        communication by tumor promoters," {Carcinogenesis,} Vol. 7,
        1982, pp. 565-585.
 
  [220] BEIR V, pp. 355-362. Supporting references include:  W. J. Blot
        and R. W. Miller, "Mental retardation following in utero exposure
        to the atomic bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki," {Radiology,} Vol.
        106, 1973, pp. 617-619, W. J. Blot, "Review of thirty years study
        of Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors," II Biological
        effect.  C. Growth and development following prenatal and children
        exposure to atomic radiation, {Journal of Radiation Research,}
        Vol. 16 (Suppl.), 1975, pp. 82-88, International Commission on
        Radiological Protection, {Developmental Effects of Irradiation on
        the Brain of the Embryo and Fetus:  ICRP Publication 49,} Oxford:
        Pergamon, 1986, R. W. Miller and J. H. Mulvihill, "Small head size
        after atomic irradiation," {Teratology,} Vol. 14, 1976, pp. 335-
        338, M. Otaki and W. J. Schull, "In utero exposure to A-bomb
        radiation and mental retardation.  A reassessment," {RERF
        Technical Report No. 1-83,} 1983, W. J. Schull and M. Otake,
        "Effects on intelligence of prenatal exposure to ionizing
        radiation," {RERF Technical Report 7-86,} 1986, United Nations
        Scientific Committee on the Effects of Ionizing Radiation
        (UNSCEAR), {Genetic and Somatic Effects of Ionizing Radiation:
        Report E. 86. IX. 9,} New York, NY:  United Nations, 1986, and
        J. W. Wood, K. G. Johnson, Y. Omori, S. Kawamoto, and R. J. Keehn,
        "Mental retardation in children exposed in utero, Hiroshima and
        Nagasaki," {American Journal of Public Health,} Vol. 57, 1967,
        pp. 1381-1390.
 
  [221] See W. J. Schull, M. Otake and Y. Yoshimaru "Effect on
        intelligence test score of prenatal exposure to ionizing radiation
        in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, A comparison of the old and new
        dosimetry systems," {1988 Revised RERF Technical Report 3-88,} In
        preparation.
 
  [222] BEIR V, p. 362, reviewing:  E. Ron, B. Modan, S. Flora,
        I. Harkedar, and R. Gureurt, "Mental function following scalp
        irradiation during childhood," {American Journal of Epidemiology,}
        Vol. 116, 1982, pp. 149-60.
 
  [223] BEIR V, p. 8.
 
  [224] See footnote 163.
 
  [225] BEIR V, p. 376, reviewing:  V. E. Archer, "Association of nuclear
        fallout with leukemia in the United States," {Archive of
        Environmental Health, Vol. 42, 1987, pp. 263-271.
 
  [226] BEIR V, p. 387, reviewing:  E. G. Knox, A. M. Stewart,
        E. A. Gilman, and G. W. Kneale, "Background radiation and
        childhood cancer," {Journal of Radiological Protection,} Vol 8,
        No. 1, 1988, pp. 9-18.
 
  [227] BEIR V, p. 6.
 
  [228] One from the U.S. is:  J. K. Lyon, M. R. Klauber, J. W. Gardner,
        and K. S. Udall "Childhood leukemias associated with fallout from
        nuclear testing," {New England Journal of Medicine,} Vol. 300,
        1979, pp. 397-402.
 
  [229] M. J. Gardner and P. D. Winter, "Mortality in Cumberland during
        1959-78 with reference to cancer in young people around Windscale
        (letter)," {The Lancet,} Vol. i, 1984, pp. 216-217, and M. J.
        Gardner, A. J. Hall, S. Downes, and J. D. Terrell, "Follow up
        study of children born to mothers resident in Seascale, West
        Cumbria (birth cohort)," {British Medical Journal,} Vol. 295,
        1987, pp. 822-827.
 
  [230] E. Roman, V. Beral, L. Carpenter, et al., "Childhood leukemia in
        the West Berkshire and Basingstoke and North Hampshire District
        Health Authorities in relation to nuclear establishments in the
        vicinity," {British Medical Journal,} Vol. 294, 1987, pp. 597-602,
        and D. J. Hole and C. R.  Gillis, "Childhood leukemia in the west
        of Scotland," {The Lancet,} Vol. 2, 1986, pp. 525.
 
  [231] BEIR V, p. 379, reviewing:  S. Openshaw, M. Charlton, A. W. Craft,
        and J. M. Birch, "Investigation of leukemia clusters by use of a
        geographical analysis machine," {The Lancet,} Vol. i, 1988,
        pp. 272-273.
 
  [232] J. L. Lyon, and K. L. Schuman, "Radioactive fallout and cancer
        (letter)," {Journal of the American Medical Association,} Vol.
        252, No. 14, 1984, pp. 1845-1855, C. J. Johnson, "Cancer incidence
        in an area of radioactive fallout downwind from the Nevada test
        site," {Journal of the American Medical Association,} Vol. 251,
        1984, pp. 230-236, G. G. Caldwell, D. Kelley, M. Zack, H. Falk,
        and C. W. Heath, "Leukemia among participants in military
        maneuvers at a nuclear bomb test:  a preliminary report," {Journal
        of the American Medical Association,} Vol. 244, 1980, pp.
        1575-1578, G. Caldwell, D. Kelley, C. W. Heath Jr., and M. Zack
        "Mortality and cancer frequency among military nuclear test
        (Smoky) participants, 1957 through 1979," {Journal of the American
        Medical Association,} Vol. 250, No. 5,1983, pp. 620-624,
        G. Caldwell, D. Kelley, C. W. Heath, Jr., and M. Zack,
        "Polcythemia vera among participants of a nuclear weapons test,"
        {Journal of the American Medical Association,} Vol. 252, 1984, pp.
        662-664, and S. C. Darby, G. M. Kendall, T. P. Fell, et al., "A
        summary of mortality and incidence of cancer in men from the
        United Kingdom who participated in the United Kingdom's
        atmospheric nuclear weapon tests and experimental programs,"
        {British Medical Journal,} Vol. 296, 1988, pp.332-338.
 
  [233] BEIR V, p. 378, reviewing:  D. Forman, P. Cook-Mozaffari,
        S. Darby, et al., "Cancer near nuclear installations," {Nature,}
        Vol. 329, 1987, pp. 499-505 and P. Cook-Mozaffari, F. L. Ashwood,
        T. Vincent, et al., "Cancer incidence and mortality in the
        vicinity of nuclear installations in England and Wales, 1950-
        1980," Studies on Medical and Population Subjects, No. 51, London:
        Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1987.  An earlier study had not
        found a clear pattern of cancer increases in individuals living
        near fourteen nuclear facilities and five non-nuclear plants in
        England and Wales.  See J. A. Baron, "Cancer mortality in small
        areas around nuclear facilities in England and Wales," {British
        Journal of Cancer,} Vol. 50, 1984, pp. 815-829.
 
  [234] Richard W. Clapp, S. Cobb, C. K. Chan, and B. Walker, Jr.,
        "Leukemia near Massachusetts nuclear power plant," {The Lancet,}
        December 5, 1987, pp. 1324-1325.
 
 

--
  The Hopi believe this is the Fourth World.  There were seven worlds created 
  at the beginning.  The first three were each destroyed in turn because the 
  humans inhabiting them had diverged too far from their original sacred path
  of connectedness with and respect for all life on Mother Earth.  Their 
  prophecies (see "Book of the Hopi" by Frank Waters) describe the possibility
  of such a destruction of the Fourth World (in the forms of uranium mining, 
  the existence of powerlines, and the atomic bomb):

       If we dig precious things from the land, we will invite disaster.

              Near the Day of Purification, there will be cobwebs 
                       spun back and forth in the sky.

           A container of ashes might one day be thrown from the sky,          
                which could burn the land and boil the oceans.



                                KOYAANISQATSI

    ko.yaa.nis.qatsi (from the Hopi Language)  n.  1. crazy life.  2. life
        in turmoil.  3. life out of balance.  4. life disintegrating.  
          5. a state of life that calls for another way of living.
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