For those living within fifty miles of the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant, there is a new way to document the potential impact of nuclear energy and radioactive waste. Breast milk: who knew it could be an (anti-)nuclear weapon?
The Mothers Milk Project is an endeavor founded by longtime activists Nancy Burton (of Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone) and Gail Merrill (a breast cancer survivor.) Rock the Reactors is a project supporter. Whether through spent nuclear fuel, radioactive waste, or medical by-products, Strontium-90, a radioactive isotope, is present in our environment.
According to Burton, goat milk sampled 5.5 miles from the Millstone Nuclear Power Station in Waterford, Conn. has tested high for strontium-90. She says the surrounding area has a high incidence of leukemia, early childhood mortality, miscarriage, bone cancer, childhood cancer and breast cancer. She wants to see if the same is true for the areas surrounding Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in Buchanan, New York.
Nuclear power proponents claim there is no health risk with nuclear energy. However, plants such as Indian Point deposit Strontium-90 and other radionuclides into our atmosphere, affecting living organisms within a certain radius of the facility.
Here is a map representing the fifty mile radius of the plant, within which the current testing is occurring.
Mothers Milk Project is taking samples from women in Fairfield County in Connecticut and Westchester and Rockland Counties in New York state. The donated cup of milk will be divided into four parts: 1/4 cup for the NY State Department of Health, 1/4 cup for Entergy (parent company of Indian Point and Vermont Yankee,) 1/4 cup to be retained by the project’s independent laboratory and 1/4 cup to be retained by the project for possible re-testing.
The Project has also requested that New York State continue testing of local animals and mammals, which it did until 1991, then stopped.
The biological activity of Strontium-90 is similar to that of calcium. It enters our body through contaminated food or water, and is deposited in our bones, teeth and bone marrow, where it can disrupt cellular activity.
During routine operations, Indian Point is designed to release fission byproducts into the air and water. One such radionuclide, krypton, rapidly decays to strontium-90, a beta particle which mimics calcium in its chemical composition. Strontium-90 is readily absorbed in bone tissue and teeth. With a half-life (decay period) of 30 years, it disrupts nearby cells and is known to cause leukemia, bone cancer, diseases of the immune system and cancers of soft tissues such as breast and lung. Children and developing babies are especially vulnerable to its effects.
Strontium-90 is linked to cancer, leukemia, and diseases of the immune system. If you live within the 50 mile radius of the plant and are currently breastfeeding, donate your milk! Anonymity is respected, as only zip codes are recorded.
“Breastfeeding mothers and others are entitled to know if harmful radioactive effluents are entering our milk supply,” Burton said. “We believe ‘breast is best’ and our babies should be protected from insidious contaminants,” she added.
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This makes me incredibly angry! I’ve lived my entire life within the radius shown above -growing up in the incomparably beautiful Hudson Valley north of Indian Point, working in Manhattan and now living on the pretty-as-a-picture Connecticut coast and I’ve had nightmares about his plant and continue to. In fact it’s the only childhood fear that still haunts my dreams.
Not only is nuclear not cost-effective, it is not as clean as advocates would like to paint it as (especially these days when half of the poorly educated so-called environmentalists are touting it as a solution to coal burning) AND we still haven’t solved the disposal issue. With the Bush Admin pushing hard for nuclear (whose lobbyists are part of big energy along with ‘clean’ coal, another farce) we need to expose the TRUTH behind nuclear power now before more plants get built.
This is a great step forward.
June 20th, 2008 at 10:23 amThanks Kim!
June 20th, 2008 at 10:53 amThe Mother’s Milk Project will be at the Clearwater Festival on the Hudson River this weekend… There’s a major fundraiser for IPSEC member organizations at the Lincoln Center on June 30th, and Rock The Reactors has its own event coming up in Woodstock on August 2nd.
The shut down Indian Point troops are mobilizing!
Rem
Keep up the good work Rem! You are an inspiration.
June 20th, 2008 at 11:26 amI’m curious, is the project doing anything to account for Sr90 that could be introduced into the environment from medical sources? Are they collecting any control samples?
June 20th, 2008 at 11:32 amReaders should be aware that all nuclear power plants licensed in the US are required to test local soil, vegetation, cow’s milk, and water, and that results from these tests are available to the public. While it contains some boring govspeak, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has a brief on health effects of nuclear plants here:
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/tooth-fairy.html
Hi E.R. I like your blog… Thanks for the page you sent. I don’t know if the Mother’s Milk Project will be collecting control samples. You should ask them. I do know their budget is limited. It was easy to blame Sr-90 on Chernobyl but they can’t do that anymore, because of the decay rate. So if new spikes of Sr-90 are found, they can no longer be blamed on that accident’s fall-out. The NRC was doing tests in the region, but they stopped, or they are still doing it, but no longer making the results available to the general public. They told the Mother’s Milk Project recently that they were not doing tests on cows or goats around Indian Point, because they weren’t any… I wonder if anyone told the farmers in Rockland County who have goats and cows that they are hallucinating.
June 20th, 2008 at 3:21 pmFYI — here’s what we’re dealing with in Washington State. This nuclear site is 55 miles from my home. We swim and water ski in the Columbia River every weekend in the summer months. This was the issue that some Portland, OR residents questioned the presidential candidates on last month (since Portland is 200 miles downwind / river from this nuclear site).
http://www.whistleblower.org/template/page.cfm?page_id=68
June 21st, 2008 at 10:30 pmIn the case of a farm animal, grazing grass downwind of a chemical release, the presence of that chemical in the animal’s milk might imply it was from that particular upwind release. It wouldn’t be conclusive, however. Other sources might have existed on the farm itself.
In the case of human beings, who don’t graze, and who occupy the pinnacle in a food production chain stretching from Peru for vegetables, to Iowa for pork, Nebraska for wheat, Argentina for soy and fish oil, Colorado for beef, to the Pacific ocean for Tuna, & swordfish, and the Gulf of Mexico for shrimp, the Catskill mountains for piped water, and to as far away as France for bottled water & wine, it is scientifically nonsensical to search for such ingestion patterns as open-air grazing herds might display.
No conclusion at all could be drawn, unless the test subjects were to live outdoors like animals, eating only local garden produce, drinking only collected rainwater, eschewing any commercially shipped delicacies for a sufficient time to flush previous long distance foods out of their bodies.
So why ask nursing mothers to test breast milk?
It looks like a soft, seemingly caring recruitment stunt, bringing notoriety and connectivity to antinuclear propagandists who have failed, in the main, to sway the rest of the populace. They’ve targeted the perfect group of vulnerable subjects to softly indoctrinate with the notion that an electric plant may endanger them and their babies, and they couch the propaganda in mock-helpful tones , saying “Oh , we just want to see what the reality is”.
However, because of the commercial food shipment chain mentioned above, and the distant provenance of our drinking water, the vast majority of milk samples will have no indicative value at all, except to imply that Greenwich Food Emporium’s sushi may contain Japanese strontium.
And contain it, it may.
From 1945 to 1995 the world was swamped with strontium from above ground nuclear explosions by half a dozen nations, blanketing the planet in a Santorini or Krakatoa-like mantle of this radioactive substance. North Korea did such a test two years ago.With a 30 year half life, the majority of this substance is still in the food chain, in Peru, Iowa, Nebraska, Japan, Argentina, in both the Pacific ocean, the Atlantic ocean, and the Gulf of Mexico, as well as right here in the northeast.
Personally, I am offended that the organizers would mislead and misuse vulnerable young women, for a mock-science publicity gambit that cannot have any definite result, even if there were gross contamination coming out of Indian Point (and there is not).
Without control samples, there can be no proof of anything, regardless.
So the exercise will be a PR stunt only, attempting to bond those mommies to the notion of Indian Point as dirty, somehow. It’s quite a stretch, just to attack someone.
AND it shows quite a callous contempt for motherhood, and the sanctity of birthing.
June 23rd, 2008 at 4:38 amI disagree Artis- I’m a woman who is still weighing the choice about whether to have children in such a crowded world, but if I do, I would be curious to see what’s in my body- I grew up in the Hudson Valley about 20 miles (thankfully upstream! but still) of Indian Point and during the growing season almost all the produce I ate came from my family’s garden, all the beef I ate (though I’m veggie now) came from the farm down the road, and my eggs came from my next-door neighbors.
My water was well-water from an underground spring.
Now I drink the city of Norwalk’s water which I filter, but it’s not from the Catskills (that’s just NYC that takes it’s water from there- what about all the private wells and local watersheds West of the Hudson, in Westchester and Putnam, and Fairfield Counties?) I, like many people in my area, strive to eat local- even my regular supermarket gets corn from CT, NY and NJ when it’s in season, and I continue to grow some of my own produce (not quite as much as when I was a kid and my grandma had the time to spend on a huge garden). I think with the (important focus) on eating local food that this is- and should be- a concern to women and men who live within the reaches of a nuclear plant.
I don’t think this is a stretch at all, and the women involved most certainly knew what they were doing. If I were breast feeding I would participate in this study. I certainly WILL NOT accept Entergy’s ‘assurances’ about what they do and do not release into my atmosphere KNOWING that they have lied - and been caught in lies- many times in the past.
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:25 amI agree with Artis on this one. Without a control for comparison, this study will only frighten mothers without offering any useful scientific data. It is imortant to be vigilant about how we treat the planet, but this seems more like a publicity stunt.
In fact, the more I think about this study, the less value I’m able to put on it. For example… has anyone studied how much strontium passes from the environment to mother’s milk (hah, imagine trying to get IRB approval on that one)? Also, wouldn’t a child’s lifetime exposure to breast milk be significantly lower than their lifetime exposure to tap water or inhaled particles? If Mothers Milk really wanted to find the reason for their problems, why would they risk missing out on the many exposure vectors that are more prevalent than breast milk?
It really does sound like a stunt to me, which is sad — the concerns of these mothers and these communities deserve to be addressed in a sensitive and helpful way.
June 23rd, 2008 at 5:23 pmCourtney, nice blog, love Chartreuse… As one who as worked so hard and so long bringing about a sustainable fashion economy, I commend you… but your take on nukes? I’m curious, how does someone like you blogging about organic fabrics come to think of nuclear power as clean and green and the solution to global warming? I mean, what argument did the nuclear power industry use with you that would have you believe such propaganda, this after 30 years of the anti-nuclear activism?
There are no independent safety assessment at any of these plants… least of which Indian Point. They’re all run like an armed fortress, same guys doing security as prisons and secret military bases.
Of course the Mother’s Milk Project is just a PR stunt, we all have Strontium-90 in our system, and that’s the whole point, it’s a propaganda effort to counteract THEIR propaganda effort spending $40 million trying to convince New York state that Indian Point is safe, when we know all three reactor pools are leaking, beyond repair, contaminating ground water.
The waste is stored right there, at water’s edge, for any idiot with a surface to air missile to blow up… contaminate the entire Hudson Valley… it’s reached a point of diminishing returns, where Indian Point can no longer be sanely defended or relicensed, without taking the risk of dooming New York like a bad horror movie.
The Mother’s Milk Project makes the point that life is more important than the culture of death the nuclear power industry comes from, the barbwire, the private security force, the millions that are spent everyday to secure the facility, costing the people of New York MORE money than ALL the profits in electricity generated by the plant.
I can sit under a wind turbine in a field of wind turbines and eat a sandwich, enjoy the gentle swoosh of the blades, and the breeze… I can touch a solar panel and feel the gentle heat of the sun flow through my fingers… that’s what “sustainable” means to me, because I know two or three generations from now, my children’s children won’t be faced with a calamity of untold proportion having to clean up this radioactive mess we left behind for them to handle! How cruel!
Be real!
But arguments won’t win the day, nobody cares about facts and figures anymore, they want to be gripped by a good story, a tear jerker, a dog and pony show… something to rally behind and say, we don’t want this plant in our backyard anymore.
The Mother’s Milk Project is probably the most sensitive and helpful thing the anti-nuclear community in New York has come up with in years, finally something with some media savvy, considering most other groups part of the IPSEC coalition are totally infiltrated by Entergy money by now. I won’t name names… cough!
June 24th, 2008 at 9:41 amDear Sir or Madam:
I would love to be part of your study. I have been nursing my daughter for
almost three years….have a little milk left. How do I go about sending you
a sample….where do I place the milk to send to you?
Oh, forgot to mention that I live was living in Cliffside Park, NJ and one month ago I moved to West New York, NJ. I believe I am within the radius.
Best of Luck with Your Efforts,
Anolan Piard
June 24th, 2008 at 11:55 amRemyC,
June 25th, 2008 at 11:33 amI think renewables are part of the sustainable solution and we have to work in that direction starting now. Resource-conservative lifestyles are another huge piece of the puzzle.
Unfortunately, there are serious geographical limitations to wind, solar, and geothermal power. There are some fortunate places where supply and demand are close to one another. But on the whole, the portions of the country with the best wind/solar/geothermal resources are distant from the population centers. Electric transmission over long distances is inefficient. I’m not sure about the ethics of the populous coastal and Midwestern states foisting their energy demand upon the High Plains and Southwest. I’m also not sure that environmentalists will acquiesce to the presence of large, high-density wind farms on public lands.
Calling the nuclear power industry part of “the culture of death” is alarmist and insults a great many hardworking women and men who care very much about the environment. Technologies are not good or bad; there are good and bad ways to apply them. Beyond this the current state of a technology can’t be judged by its origins. Many common technologies owe their existence to military origins. I’m not a bad person because I use the Internet (which was created by ARPA for defense purposes) or because I make long-distance phone calls enabled by satellites (which are put in orbit by rockets descended from Nazi technology). Fission isn’t bad simply because it’s been used to make bombs.
That said, the continued safe operation of the nuclear industry is costly, and its fuel and waste needs make it unsustainable. We’re somewhat stuck with it for some time, so I think it’s important to try to make it cheap and safe. At the same time, we need to encourage resource-conservative lifestyles and mass-localization of energy production using renewable sources.
“Calling the nuclear power industry part of “the culture of death” is alarmist and insults a great many hardworking women and men who care very much about the environment.”
Good, I’m glad, you should feel insulted. ALL nuclear workers, if not directly involved in cleaning up the horrendous mess their industry has caused this planet in the last 50 years, are indeed part of death culture.
Fission is the worse calamity that ever befell humanity! The long term consequences of that blunder will be felt for generations to come, if it doesn’t destroy us all way before then, with tens of thousands lethal and leaking nuclear waste dump sites scattered all over the globe.
There is no such thing as safe nuclear power, other than perhaps with the use of Helium 3. Only accidents, radiation, disease… to enrich the monstruous greedy few owners of the Federal Bank Reserve!
How much is Entergy paying you? Not enough, I’m sure, because the devil’s got your soul! Uranium is the tool of Satan.
July 3rd, 2008 at 7:08 amRemyC,
July 3rd, 2008 at 10:05 amYou and I must read different Bibles. Mine doesn’t mention uranium.
Would you care to comment on my concerns about the limitations of nuclear energy? How about any of my ethical or environmental concerns about industrial-scale use of renewables?
Response to Artis Mayo’s comment : I lived 30 kilometers from Civaux the most modern
July 3rd, 2008 at 10:33 amnuke plant in Europe. They were not without technical problems inspite of the most
up-to-date technology…Just as a for instance thier fail-safe device which prevents
supercriticality with the introduction of Boron to seperate neutrons in friction FAILED
TWICE during try-outs!!! Anyway the French Dairy industry printed up a folder on steps to
take in case of a nuclear accident. Essentially don’t drink the milk from irradiated areas.
By the way what are you worried about ? If they find radioactivity in mother’s milk and this
radioactivity can be identified as comming from a nuke plant then you should be glad they
have identified the source of a noxious element and hope they can close it down.
King James Bible
July 6th, 2008 at 7:05 amAnd he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.
RemyC,
That’s very creative, but I don’t see any mention of uranium. And the parallel between nuclear energy and the “great furnace” falls apart in the following two verses (in Rev 9):
3And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power.
4And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.
I’m not sure how much value there is in the use of a single verse, divorced not only from its historical and cultural context, but from the rest of the passage where it resides.
July 7th, 2008 at 10:24 amI think we’ve meandered quite a way from the original point of this post, and I’m not sure many people (our patient hosts included) want to read a debate scripture here. If you’re interested in continuing, it might be a good idea to move this to my collaborative blog, where there’s been some recent discussion on religion (particularly Christianity) and the environment .
RemyC — I am so sorry, but you are really jumping the gun with your statements about my comment. Please read it again. I make no statement for or against nuclear power (I am not informed enough to speak with any authority about the eventual impact of ANY power production technology… it’s just not my field.)
I merely said that the study designed by Mother’s Milk is a bad study. It has no controls. It can draw no conclusions. I support responsible energy as much as the next person, but I also support responsible activism. Creating a bogus and inflammatory study as a publicity stunt does a disservice to the community this organization is trying to help. I respect that Mother’s Milk has a limited budget (I too was in nonprofit once) but I think there are better ways to spend their $ than promising false hope to a community with real fears.
I am working on getting my MD, and I can tell you — one of the first requirements doctors have when we design ANY study (even just surveys!) is that the results can be used to benefit the population being studied. It’s our moral imperative, if you will, once someone has placed their trust in us and allowed us to observe them.
But what benefit does these mothers receive? This study is also so badly designed that it’s unlikely for anyone to take it seriously. Where are the controls? What are the vectors? Artis is right — there’s a blanket of radioactive material spread over the world from our idiotic weapons testing. So you know what? The milk WILL be radioactive! Because everything is. Without a way to compare it to other milk from mothers in the same time period, age range and socioeconomic bracket, the data will be useless.
You can rage all you want about nuclear power and its evils, but there are many small injustices in this world, and I think misusing the trust of mothers by promising them results from a study that can’t provide results is one them.
July 7th, 2008 at 5:20 pmshe loves what you do.wow
amazing
July 13th, 2008 at 4:50 pmi wanted to greet every body here…
remy ,courtney, dunhill ,miss anolan piard, starre , and all the others…..
i am jenny…new to this and enjoy it….after few days ,i will tell you my experience with something.so please wait for it..
jenny.
July 15th, 2008 at 6:25 pmMy daughter Kristin has lived most of her life within 10 miles of Indian Point. When she was a baby I donated her baby teeth to the Tooth Fairy Project, which showed she was being exposed to Strontium 90. Now she’s been a nursing mother for the past 9 months, thinking she was doing the best she could for her baby. Has she been passing Strontium 90 to her baby directly through her breast milk? It’s horrible to imagine. She is donating her 2nd sample to the Mother’s Milk Project today and encourages all nursing mothers to do the same so we can find out if our breast milk is harming our babies.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:51 am