Re: FreeMalaysiaToday: Lynas poses risk of another (Bukit Merah) 80’s radioactive tragedy, says green group
Soo Wern Jun
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June 12, 2019 8:30 AM
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IS THERE REALLY A TRAGEDY IN BUKIT MERAH ?
We have to realise that the feedstock used in the Bukit Merah plant is Monazite ore in Amang or tin tailings.
The monazite ore has an activity of well over 284 Bq/g or 4,700% more radioactive than that of Lynas' WLP or ore concentrate.
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In spite of the fact that the Bukit Merah waste's radioactivity is thousands of percentage points higher than that of Lynas,
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there is not a single well documented scientifically proven case of death or even injury that has been attributed to the radiation from the Bukit Merah rare earth plant.
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♥ UNSCEAR ADMIT THAT THEY WERE WRONG TO IMPLY THAT THERE IS NO SAFE LEVEL OF RADIATION !
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There IS a safe level!
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UNSCEAR (THE UNITED NATIONS SCENTIFIC COMMITTEE ON THE EFFECTS OF ATOMIC RADIATION) HAS FINALLY ADMITTED THAT RADIATION DOSES LESS THAN ABOUT 10 rem (100 mSv ) per year ARE SAFE.
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(Note: 100 mSv = 5,000,000 % Lynas worst case scenario)
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Public dose limits for exposure from uranium mining or nuclear plants are usually set at 1 mSv per year above background.
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♥ Study by scientists at John Hopkins University published in 1988 by American Journal of Epidemiology, concluded that, their study plus the fact that there is NO CONGENITAL DEFECTS DEMONSTRATED IN STUDIES ON THE ATOMIC BOMB SURVIVORS IN HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI, suggests that
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LOW DOSE RADIATION CANNOT CAUSE CONGENITAL DEFECTS.
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♥ THE NCRP and ICRP recommendations for the maximum permissible dose (MPD) of radiation are:
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General Public annual MPD by both NCRP and ICRP is 1 mSv.
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For Radiation Workers, the annual MPD is 50 mSv (NCRP) and 20 mSv (ICRP), with a cumulative MPD of 10 mSv x Age.
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MPD during pregnancy is 5 mSv (NCRP) and 2 mSv (ICRP).
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However, experts including Professor Wade Allison of Oxford University argue that the dose limit can safely be raised to 100 mSv, based on current health statistics.
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Compare this with the dose of 0.002 mSv/year of exposure for people living within 1 km of the Lynas plant in the worst case scenario (estimated by Lynas).
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I have seen lots of cases of leukaemia and other types of cancer as well as birth defects over the last 40 years or so and unfortunately we do not have Lynas around at that time to use as a scapegoat.
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Unscrupulous people have been using videos and pictures of patients with congenital abnormalities and other illnesses to instil fear into the population. There is absolutely no scientific proof that these cases are caused by radiation.
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THEY POST PICTURES OF POOR SUFFERING CHILDREN AND OTHERS WITH UNRELATED TUMOURS AND DISEASES.
THEY MILK THE SUFFERING OF OTHERS IN A SICK ATTEMPT TO LINK LYNAS TO THESE TERRIBLE ILLNESSES.
THIS IS TRULY UNFAIR.
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Only people with ulterior motives would use pictures and videos of these unfortunate patients whose disorders have nothing to do with radiation to score political points!
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BUKIT MERAH STUDY THONG MK
In a very large study of birth defects over a 14 month period in the Kinta district in 2005, Thong MK from the University of Malaya found that there were 253 babies with major birth defects in 17,720 births, giving an incidence of 14.3/1,000 births or
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a BIRTH PREVALENCE OF 1 IN 70,
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i.e. 1 out of every 70 babies born in the Kinta District
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which include the Bukit Merah village
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has a with a major birth defect !
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Since Bukit Merah village has a population of 11,000
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we would expect to have 157 people with birth defects in
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this village. Granted that babies with major birth defects
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are prone to have a shorter life span, even if their life
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span is half that of a normal person, we should expect
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to find about 78 people with a major congenital defect
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in Bukit Merah.
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SO IT WOULD NOT BE DIFFICULT FOR THE ANTI-
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LYNAS FOLKS TO FIND A COUPLE OF UNFORTUNATE
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SOULS WITH CONGENITAL DEFECTS and blame it on
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the radiation ! ! ! 
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In the south of the state of Kerala in India the soil contains as much as 4,000 ppm (parts of Thorium per million). Studies have shown that there is little or no accumulation of Thorium-232 in the inhabitants.
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The Lynas waste contains only 1,650 ppm.
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In Ramsar, Iran, the naturally occurring radiation
is extremely high at 260 mSv/yr.
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This is 13,000,000% higher than the expected worse case scenario in Kuantan.
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And the people in Ramsar, Iran has been found to be healthier and live longer than the rest of the Iranians! There is also no increase in the number of cancer cases.
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Remember the Tin tailings and slag from the Eastern Smelting and Straits Trading in Penang? These contain the tantalum and monazite ore.
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And these radioactive tin tailings and slag were used to fill up the old Penang Stadium and the roads in Penang. A lot of these has already been stolen and sold off at a huge profit, but a lot still remains in the roads in Butterworth and Penang island.
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The people in Penang have not developed Cancer so far as a result of these slag!
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The anti-Lynas people who are so paranoid about imported radiation from Australia should have a look at this paper published in the Malaysian Journal of Analytical Sciences which showed that the level of radiation in areas where tin was mined. The waste or Amang contains high levels of Monazite and other minerals which are highly radioactive.
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All these old tin mine areas are well populated. Note even Kuala Lumpur is also an ex-tin mining area.
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A study was done University Technology MARA in Kg Gajah in Perak :
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Quote: " The level of surface dose varies from one location to another, but there is a critical area which has a significantly high surface dose approaching 30 microSv/hr " Unquote
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30 microSv/hr is about the same level as the highest recorded area in Ramsar!
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Even ordinary Sand (crystalline silica, SiO2) is classified as a group 1 Carcinogen (a confirmed cancer causing agent), but as you know, we do not expect a huge number of people in living in the deserts or along the seashores to die from silica induced lung cancer.
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The lung cancer risk occurs only when fine sand (silica) is inhaled by miners for a prolonged period in the quarries and mines i.e. silica is not a carcinogen when ingested and of course not when injected for nobody would allow you to inject sand into their veins.
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Thorium-232 is a very weakly radioactive substance and produces only alpha particles which cannot even penetrate a thin piece of paper.
All you have to do is to wrap it up in a piece of newspaper and it is for all intents and purposes, non-radioactive !
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Thorium-232 is considered to be a carcinogen only IF ADMINISTERED INTRAVENOUSLY AS A COLLOIDAL DISPERSION OF THORIUM-232 DIOXIDE.
It is not considered to be a cancer causing substance if taken orally or inhaled according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer IARC, just like silica (sand) which is not carcinogenic if ingested.
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The only so-called scientific study were done by Dr Bertell and Dr Jayabalan
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To be taken seriously as a valid study, it should have a valid high quality statistical analysis with statistically significant results and repeated studies must show similar results. The above studies above do not have any of these characteristics and qualities.
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And moreover, the study should be double blind and involve a large number of subjects. The above studies above do not have it.
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(20min delay)