RESUMO
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the potential radiological impact of atmospheric nuclear weapons tests conducted in 1966-1974 at Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls on populations in Oceania, South America and Africa. METHODS: Results of measurements of total beta(ß)-concentrations in filtered air and 131I activity concentrations in locally produced cow's milk in Oceania, South America and Africa after the tests were compared with those in French Polynesia. Radiation doses due to external irradiation and thyroid doses due to 131I intake with milk by local populations were also compared. RESULTS: Higher total ß-concentrations in filtered air, 131I activity concentrations in locally produced milk and radiation doses to local population were, in general, observed in French Polynesia than in other countries in the southern hemisphere. However, for specific years during the testing period, the radiological impact to South America was found to be similar or slightly higher than that to Tahiti. The resulting thyroid doses in the considered countries were lower than those in French Polynesia with two exceptions: thyroid doses due to 131I intake with cow's milk for 1-y old child in 1968 were higher in Peru (0.35 mGy) and in Madagascar (0.30 mGy) than in Tahiti (0.25 mGy). However, the populations outside French Polynesia received doses lower than those from the natural sources of radiation. CONCLUSION: According to the current knowledge in radiation epidemiology, it is very unlikely that nuclear fallout due to French nuclear tests had a measurable radiological and health impact outside French Polynesia.
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Assuntos
Armas Nucleares , Doses de Radiação , Exposição à Radiação/estatística & dados numéricos , África , Animais , Partículas beta , França , Humanos , Radioisótopos do Iodo/análise , Madagáscar , Leite/química , Oceania , Peru , Polinésia , Monitoramento de Radiação , América do SulRESUMO
The National Cancer Institute study of projected health risks to New Mexico residents from the 1945 Trinity nuclear test provides best estimates of organ radiation absorbed doses received by representative persons according to ethnicity, age, and county. Doses to five organs/tissues at significant risk from exposure to radioactive fallout (i.e., active bone marrow, thyroid gland, lungs, stomach, and colon) from the 63 most important radionuclides in fresh fallout from external and internal irradiation were estimated. The organ doses were estimated for four resident ethnic groups in New Mexico (Whites, Hispanics, Native Americans, and African Americans) in seven age groups using: (1) assessment models described in a companion paper, (2) data on the spatial distribution and magnitude of radioactive fallout derived from historical documents, and (3) data collected on diets and lifestyles in 1945 from interviews and focus groups conducted in 2015-2017 (described in a companion paper). The organ doses were found to vary widely across the state with the highest doses directly to the northeast of the detonation site and at locations close to the center of the Trinity fallout plume. Spatial heterogeneity of fallout deposition was the largest cause of variation of doses across the state with lesser differences due to age and ethnicity, the latter because of differences in diets and lifestyles. The exposure pathways considered included both external irradiation from deposited fallout and internal irradiation via inhalation of airborne radionuclides in the debris cloud as well as resuspended ground activity and ingestion of contaminated drinking water (derived both from rivers and rainwater cisterns) and foodstuffs including milk products, beef, mutton, and pork, human-consumed plant products including leafy vegetables, fruit vegetables, fruits, and berries. Tables of best estimates of county population-weighted average organ doses by ethnicity and age are presented. A discussion of our estimates of uncertainty is also provided to illustrate a lower and upper credible range on our best estimates of doses. Our findings indicate that only small geographic areas immediately downwind to the northeast received exposures of any significance as judged by their magnitude relative to natural radiation. The findings presented are the most comprehensive and well-described estimates of doses received by populations of New Mexico from the Trinity nuclear test.
Assuntos
Poluentes Radioativos do Ar/análise , Dieta , Estilo de Vida , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/diagnóstico , Armas Nucleares/estatística & dados numéricos , Cinza Radioativa/análise , Medição de Risco/métodos , Adolescente , Adulto , Poluentes Radioativos do Ar/efeitos adversos , Carga Corporal (Radioterapia) , Criança , Pré-Escolar , Feminino , Humanos , Lactente , Recém-Nascido , Masculino , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/epidemiologia , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/etiologia , New Mexico/epidemiologia , Vigilância da População , Doses de Radiação , Monitoramento de Radiação , Cinza Radioativa/efeitos adversos , Eficiência Biológica Relativa , Adulto JovemRESUMO
Trinity was the first test of a nuclear fission device. The test took place in south-central New Mexico at the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range at 05:29 AM on 16 July 1945. This article provides detailed information on the methods that were used in this work to estimate the radiation doses that were received by the population that resided in New Mexico in 1945. The 721 voting precincts of New Mexico were classified according to ecozone (plains, mountains, or mixture of plains and mountains), and size of resident population (urban or rural). Methods were developed to prepare estimates of absorbed doses from a range of 63 radionuclides to five organs or tissues (thyroid, active marrow, stomach, colon, and lung) for representative individuals of each voting precinct selected according to ethnicity (Hispanic, White, Native American, and African American) and age group in 1945 (in utero, newborn, 1-2 y, 3-7 y, 8-12 y, 13-17 y, and adult). Three pathways of human exposure were included: (1) external irradiation from the radionuclides deposited on the ground; (2) inhalation of radionuclide-contaminated air during the passage of the radioactive cloud and, thereafter, of radionuclides transferred (resuspended) from soil to air; and (3) ingestion of contaminated water and foodstuffs. Within the ingestion pathway, 13 types of foods and sources of water were considered. Well established models were used for estimation of doses resulting from the three pathways using parameter values developed from extensive literature review. Because previous experience and calculations have shown that the annual dose delivered during the year following a nuclear test is much greater than the doses received in the years after that first year, the time period that was considered is limited to the first year following the day of the test (16 July 1945). Numerical estimates of absorbed doses, based on the methods described in this article, are presented in a separate article in this issue.
Assuntos
Poluentes Radioativos do Ar/análise , Dieta , Armas Nucleares/estatística & dados numéricos , Monitoramento de Radiação/métodos , Cinza Radioativa/análise , Eficiência Biológica Relativa , Medição de Risco/métodos , Adolescente , Adulto , Carga Corporal (Radioterapia) , Criança , Pré-Escolar , Feminino , Humanos , Lactente , Recém-Nascido , Masculino , New Mexico/epidemiologia , Vigilância da População , Doses de Radiação , Adulto JovemRESUMO
The Trinity nuclear test, conducted in 1945, exposed residents of New Mexico to varying degrees of radioactive fallout. Companion papers in this issue have detailed the results of a dose reconstruction that has estimated tissue-specific radiation absorbed doses to residents of New Mexico from internal and external exposure to radioactive fallout in the first year following the Trinity test when more than 90% of the lifetime dose was received. Estimated radiation doses depended on geographic location, race/ethnicity, and age at the time of the test. Here, these doses were applied to sex- and organ-specific risk coefficients (without applying a dose and dose rate effectiveness factor to extrapolate from a population with high-dose/high-dose rates to those with low-dose/low-dose rates) and combined with baseline cancer rates and published life tables to estimate and project the range of radiation-related excess cancers among 581,489 potentially exposed residents of New Mexico. The total lifetime baseline number of all solid cancers [excluding thyroid and non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC)] was estimated to be 183,000 from 1945 to 2034. Estimates of ranges of numbers of radiation-related excess cancers and corresponding attributable fractions from 1945 to 2034 incorporate various sources of uncertainty. We estimated 90% uncertainty intervals (UIs) of excess cancer cases to be 210 to 460 for all solid cancers (except thyroid cancer and NMSC), 80 to 530 for thyroid cancer, and up to 10 for leukemia (except chronic lymphocytic leukemia), with corresponding attributable fractions ranging from 0.12% to 0.25%, 3.6% to 20%, and 0.02% to 0.31%, respectively. In the counties of Guadalupe, Lincoln, San Miguel, Socorro, and Torrance, which received the greatest fallout deposition, the 90% UI for the projected fraction of thyroid cancers attributable to radioactive fallout from the Trinity test was estimated to be from 17% to 58%. Attributable fractions for cancer types varied by race/ethnicity, but 90% UIs overlapped for all race/ethnicity groups for each cancer grouping. Thus, most cancers that have occurred or will occur among persons exposed to Trinity fallout are likely to be cancers unrelated to exposures from the Trinity nuclear test. While these ranges are based on the most detailed dose reconstruction to date and rely largely on methods previously established through scientific committee agreement, challenges inherent in the dose estimation, and assumptions relied upon both in the risk projection and incorporation of uncertainty are important limitations in quantifying the range of radiation-related excess cancer risk.
Assuntos
Poluentes Radioativos do Ar/análise , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/diagnóstico , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/epidemiologia , Armas Nucleares/estatística & dados numéricos , Cinza Radioativa/análise , Medição de Risco/métodos , Adolescente , Adulto , Idoso , Poluentes Radioativos do Ar/efeitos adversos , Carga Corporal (Radioterapia) , Criança , Pré-Escolar , Feminino , Humanos , Lactente , Recém-Nascido , Masculino , Pessoa de Meia-Idade , Neoplasias Induzidas por Radiação/etiologia , New Mexico/epidemiologia , Vigilância da População , Doses de Radiação , Monitoramento de Radiação , Cinza Radioativa/efeitos adversos , Adulto JovemRESUMO
This paper describes dose reconstruction for a joint Ukrainian-American case-control study of leukemia that was conducted in a cohort of 110,645 male Ukrainian cleanup workers of the Chornobyl (Chernobyl) accident who were exposed to various radiation doses over the 1986-1990 time period. Individual bone-marrow doses due to external irradiation along with respective uncertainty distributions were calculated for 1,000 study subjects using the RADRUE method, which employed personal cleanup history data collected in the course of an interview with the subject himself if he was alive or with two proxies if he was deceased. The central estimates of the bone-marrow dose distributions range from 3.7 × 10(-5) to 3,260 mGy, with an arithmetic mean of 92 mGy. The uncertainties in the individual stochastic dose estimates can be approximated by lognormal distributions; the average geometric standard deviation is 2.0.