How the World Health Organisation covered up Iraq’s nuclear nightmare | Nafeez Ahmed | Environment | theguardian.com
A UN report summary contradicts other research findings about birth defects seen in Iraq which would point to the use of Depleted Uranium (DU) as a cause. The DOD’s own training film on DU claims that it is safe as long as the tanks and missiles made of this recycled radioactive waste are not damaged so aerosols of fragmented DU become airborne. At that point the DU can be breathed in and absorbed into the blood stream by the lungs to become life threatening . Of course in a war zone like Iraq this is exactly what has happened to the DU used to harden tanks, bullets and missiles.
Dr. Keith Bavistock of the Department of Environmental Science, University of Eastern Finland, a retired 13-year WHO expert on radiation and health, criticizes the summary:
“The way this document has been produced is extremely suspicious. There are question marks about the role of the US and UK, who have a conflict of interest in this sort of study due to compensation issues that might arise from findings determining a link between higher birth defects and DU. I can say that the US and UK have been very reluctant to disclose the locations of DU deployment, which might throw further light on this correlation.”