India Infant Mortality and Nuclear Tests

The health effects of worldwide nuclear activities on India: Infant mortality and Under 5 Mortality
By R. Ashok Kumar, B.E., M.E., Negentropist, Bombay Sarvodaya Mandal,299, Tardeo Road, Nana Chowk, Mumbai-400007. Tel No. 022- 23872061
e-mail: ashokuku@rediffmail.com
Copyright ©2015-2019 Ramaswami Ashok Kumar
Note: Please Right click on the tables and figures to view them each in a separate tab

Abstract
1. Infant Mortality Rate and Under 5 Mortality Rate
The paper shows that the Indian infant mortality rate in the nuclear age (1945 onwards) has more than doubled compared to the pre-nuclear age and is statistically significant (95% confidence limits for a mean Relative Risk of 2.34 being 1.33 to 4.67 : Table 1). Nuclear activity worldwide during 1945 to 1999 has probably mainly contributed to an excess infant mortality in India of 22,676600(about 23 million infant deaths in the age group 0-1) compared to the period 1911-1945. See Figure 1. Further a study of the under 5 mortality rate shows that there is a similar doubling of the risk of under 5 mortality and with a similar holocaust(Table U5MRPRENN). The recommendations of the European Committee on Radiation Risk (ECRR 2003) appear to support this assertion. The nuclear activities till 1993 have resulted in a total collective ionizing radiation dose commitment of 123 mSv per person based on World population of 5 billion assumed by UNSCEAR ( page 133, ECRR 2003).










When we consider the period 1946 to 1989, the yearly excess infant mortality over the annual mean during the period 1911-45(The control group of the prenuclear age), the following figures result(Table IMNA):





1a. Ten Year totals of Infant Mortality correlate extremely significantly with the Northern Hemisphere Adult Ingest and Inhale Radiation Dose due to Atmospheric Tests of Nuclear Weapons: 1945 to 1989: Linear regression: r= 0.72, degrees of freedom 43, p= 1.94E-8(Figure WIMP6070):






1b: Figure TYIMP63 identifies the culprit with a logarithmic fit of the ten year totals of infant mortality with the weapons dose: When the dose peaks at 1963, the ten year Infant Mortality Total also peaks.




1c. The percent annual population growth rate(compound) correlates with 10 year totals of Infant mortality extremely significantly(Figure AGRP).




1d. The annual growth rate of the India population resonates with the Northern Hemisphere ingest and inhale annual dose due to atmospheric test of nuclear weapons, 1945 to 1989(Figure PED):




To indicate a sense of the reality on the ground, Table 2 shows the calculation on the percent infant mortality excess relative risk per unit ECRR dose commitment. Compare this with the risk factor which ECRR cites for this birth effect: Percent increase in baseline rate per mSv (ECRR) parental exposure in year of conception: 0.05%. This 0.05% is got according to ECRR recommendations by computing dose according to ECRR model and including new weighting factors Wj and Wk .



Table 2: The excess relative risk in percent of infant mortality in India on account of global nuclear activity from 1945 till 1993 based on ECRR collective total effective dose commitment (123 mSv per person, see text).

The India U5MR
The figures of infant mortality and relative risks are also robust over the 0-4 infant mortality rates and mortality figures as shown in the Table U5MRPRENN below:



When man-made poisons are introduced into the biosphere infinitely more than the natural, nature reacts by doubling the risk prevalent prior to the introduction. Thus as seen in column 12h in the above table, the relative risk of 0-4 infant mortality in the nuclear age doubles compared to that in the prenuclear era( See Figure U5MRPRENN below). Compared to the data for infant mortality, the data readily available for 0-4 mortality was less. Still the robustness of the results is preserved. What a holocaust. Andrei Sakharov should have been immediately followed and implemented(1955). Rather than the two heads of state enjoying tea at a Texas ranch after all the damage has been initiated, never to be controlled.



This foresight is what is required rather than hindsight. Why then all the damages of the cold war? To what end? They are making the same mistake through new nuke deals. For example with India. What say have the citizens on this irreversible trend?


3.Correlation between ionizing radiation dose and infant mortality rate.
Let us now consider the radiation dose to the bone marrow of an “average child” born in 1950 in millirems. A study of the correlation between the Indian Infant Mortality Rate and this radiation dose shows that while the linear regression is statistically extremely significant during 1951 to 1999(r = 0.47,p=0.0006,degrees of freedom 47), there is no statistically significant correlation between the Indian Infant Mortality Rate during the pre-nuclear period 1911-1945 with this dose assumed to start from 1911 instead of 1951 and end by 1945(r = 0.32, p= 0.056, degrees of freedom 33)(Reference 2).

4.The correlation between radiation and All-India annual rainfall is shown below(Figure2) (Reference 4 and 5):





5.The correlation between ionizing radiation dose and excess infant mortality rate is brought out in Figure 3(Reference 4):






6.The dose to the parent has a pronounced and significant effect on Infant Mortality(Figure 4):





7. References and Notes

1. Reference for dose commitment for nuclear activities 1945 to 1993:Chris Busby,Rosalie Bertell, IS Feuerhake,Molly Scott Cato and Alexei Yablokov. 2003. 2003 Recommendations of the ECRR: The Health Effects of Ionising Radiation Exposure at Low Doses for Radiation Protection Purposes. Regulators’ Edition. Published on behalf of the European Committee on Radiation Risk. Green Audit. U.K.
2. For Section 1 and Figure 4, the radiation dose for the period 1951-80 has been taken from Figure 3: “Annual Radiation doses to the red bone marrow of the average child born in 1950 from diagnostic medical practices, nuclear weapons fallout and natural radiation: Risk of leukaemia calculated to the age 20 years,” in “Assessing Risks of Childhood leukaemia in Seascale” in the book Jones, Robin Russel and Richard Southwood (editors), 1987. Radiation and Health: The Biological Effects of Low-level Exposure to Ionising Radiation. Edited proceedings of a symposium, “The Biological Effects of Radiation,” sponsored by Friends of the Earth U.K. and Greenpeace International, and held between 24-25 November 1986 at the Hammersmith Hospital, London; Sir Richard Southwood, Chair. (London: John Wiley & Sons.). For the period beyond 1980 the doses are derived from these values. I have made no reconciliation between these dose values and the corresponding ECRR doses.
3. The sources for the infant mortality data for India are 1) Office of the Registrar General, Sample Registration Bulletin, Ministry of Home Affairs, New Delhi(Various issues); 2) Office of the Registrar General, Registrar General’s Newsletter, Ministry of Home Affairs, New Delhi( Various issues);3) Tata Services Ltd., Department of Economics and Statistics.1998. Statistical Outline of India 1998-99. Table 36, p46 and 4) Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat, World Population Prospects: The 2004 Revision and World Urbanization Prospects: The 2003 Revision, http://esa.un.org/unpp, 22 December 2005; 8:34:55 AM.
4. The source for growth of population, birth rate and population is Tata Services Ltd., Department of Economics and Statistics.1998. Statistical Outline of India 1998-99. Tables 34,35, pp45-46.
5. The source for the radiation doses for the studies reported above(Figures 2 , 3 and WIMP6070) is UNSCEAR 2000: Annex C: Exposures to the public from man-made sources of radiation: Table 16: Annual effective dose from radionuclides produced in atmospheric nuclear testing: Average annual effective dose(microsieverts): Northern Hemisphere. For Figure 4 the data for the dose is from that given in 2.
6. The rainfall data is from the website: Columbia University Website: http://ingrid.Ldgo.columbia.edu/Sources/Indices/.india/.rainfall/

Stop Nuclear Energy Programmes

http://plutoniumaradiumabillionpeoplehitdna.blogspot.com/2007/12/stop-nuclear-energy-programmes.html

© 2013-2019 Ramaswami Ashok Kumar

Re: "PM to visit ‘cradle of nuclear energy’",(Deccan Herald, 28 August 2007), citing a picturesque fishing hamlet, little does the report inform readers about the ban on fishing on a 100 km radius around the Tarapur conglomerate. Little does the report also inform about the nuclear equipment only conforming to unsound Risk recommendations of the International Commission on Radiological Protection(ICRP), based as they are on acute external irradiation. The alternate Risk Recommendations of the European Committee on
Radiation Risk(ECRR 2003)(Ref 1) based on internal radiation contamination have unequivocal evidence of the ICRP Risk Recommendations being 100 to 2000 fold lower than the real risks of ionising radiation. Thus the ECRR recommends that the maximum permissible radiation dose to members of the public arising from all human practices(including coal fired power plants)should not be more than 0.1 millisieverts (mSv) per year.
According to ICRP however, doses below 5 mSv per year, as defined by their system(modeling risk on the basis of acute external irradiation which is unscientific pre-DNA era stuff) can have no measurable consequences. The ECRR Recommendation of 0.1 mSv per year would severely curtail the application of nuclear fission to produce electricity. Hence Nuclear power stations are the costliest way of producing energy when health effects are also taken into account. By applying the precautionary principle which suggests that when we are unsure about the risks of a certain industrial process or its pollutants, we should not allow it to proceed until we can be sure that it is safe, all radioactive emissions must be stopped forthwith till they are proved safe by the latest science and technology research which can be independently verified. In this connection readers may note that a Sievert is a subjective measure of radiation dose based on the Gray, a Joule of energy delivered to a kilogramme of tissue. Note that a radioactive element (the radionuclide being Plutonium 239 or Radium 226 (mining uranium or in a coal fired plant, the flyash)) lodged in a living cell may deliver (5000000 to 6000000)x10^-19 Wattseconds(Joules) in 10^-17 seconds(Ref 2) to a DNA molecule in a cell weighing 512x10^-15 kg. The dose to the cell then is about 1000 mSv. The dose to the DNA weighing much less is much much more (a million times or so)! The dose to the cell is delivered at the rate of 50-60 KW or at a power surge of average muscle power of more than a thousand people! What the ECRR is recommending is that nukes should not deliver a dose of more than that corresponding to a 5 W-6W hit to a single cell. Since there are hundreds of thousands of DNAs in a single cell, the hit should not be more than say 5-6 megawatts(MW) or equivalent to those delivered by a hundred thousand musclemen to a single DNA! And the ICRP says 5 mSv or 50 times the ECRR’s dose or 250-360 Megawatts( equivalent to the power of 5 million muscle men to a single DNA or 25% of the 1200 MW at Tarapur ) causes an unmeasurable effect! Surely stop this madness!
But this madness has been Hyden by the IAEA by ’ institutionalizing Cold War secrecy and control in 1959 in an agreement between the World Health Organisation(WHO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA) which had the effect of giving the IAEA a power of veto over WHO research into radiation effects.’ The ECRR Committee noted that ’ this agreement[Res WHA 12-40,28.5.59] is still in force….and believe that accurate reports of the health consequences of the Chernobyl catastrophe may have been suppressed as a result of it.’(Ref 1).
See the effects of the agreement mentioned above: Millions of Indian infants killed and millions still born on account of nuclear activities since 1945:

http://deathdealersnukes.blogspot.com/

Andrei Sakharov and others fought bitterly against this violation of human rights enshrined in the UN Charter. Vareva! Now we have the Nuke Deal to be perhaps making the way clear for another bout of irreversible crimes against life by initiating a programme of nuclear energy in India and elsewhere.

ECRR: So how might we apply rights-based ethical theories to the activities of the nuclear industry? While the debate continues about the level of harmfulness of emissions, it is accepted by all sides that the production of energy from nuclear sources will create a fixed amount of radioactive pollutants which will be released to the environment and will inevitably contaminate the bodies of those who live in that environment. Such activity carried out without the full knowledge of the citizenry, and certainly without their informed consent, represents an infringement of the most fundamental natural right: the right to inviolability of the body…’ According to the UN Declaration of Human Rights “Everyone has the right to life,liberty and security of the person” and hence contamination of citizens’ bodies with nuclear waste represents an unacceptable threat to the security of the person, and is therefore illegal under international law, interprets the ECRR.
Moreover, nuclear energy system is not even utilitarian: On the same land used by the nuke cycle, forests use all the inputs nature gives and produce multiple goods and services infinitely more than nukes, when the principle of return is practiced.
'There is no pure reason for the non-harmonised
Nor for the non-harmonised is there concentration,
For one without concentration,
There is no peace,
And for the unpeaceful how can there be happiness?'
-The Bhagavad-Gita
Citizens! Arise to secure Freedom from the nuke menace which would extend into the far future: at least five hundred generations. Arise now!
Peace! Peace! Peace!

References.
1. Busby,C et al.Eds.2003. Recommendations of the European Committee on Radiation Risk: Health
Effects of Ionising Radiation Exposure at Low Doses for Radiation Protection Purposes. Regulators’
Edition: Brussels. p 183.
2.Gofman,J.W.1990.Radiation Induced Cancer from Low Dose Exposure: An Independent Analysis.
Chapter 19-3.

R. Ashok Kumar,B.E.,M.E(Power),Negentropist, Bombay Sarvodaya Mandal, 299, Tardeo Road, Nana Chowk, Mumbai-400007.