provided an opportunity to establish unequivocally that ex tremely little if any of the considerable amount of 1311 that be came concentrated in the thyroids found its way to the glands via the lungs; and the occasion rendered possible a detailed study of the rates of rise and fall of 1311 in the thyroid glands of grazing animals in relation to the degree of contamination of the pastures.
Misstatement #7: Radioiodine uptake ‘far below those that are expected to produce any observable effects’ Both the 1957 and 1958 AWTSC papers stated that the radioiodine up take by grazing animals reported by Marston would have no effect on the animals or the food chain. Marston on the other hand considered that his observations emphasize the speed with which grazing animals assimilate and concentrate 131I from constituents of the fission products that become deposited on pasture in areas traversed by the clouds of debris arising from atomic explosions. In these cir cumstances it may reasonably be assumed that a rapid accumu62
Counting down to the 1956 Melbourne Olympics: Cockups and Coverups
lation of 131I in the thyroids of grazing cattle indicates a rapid gathering of 89Sr [Strontium], 90Sr [Strontium], and of other bone-seeking isotopes, and a speedy launching of these radio active substances, via milk, into human foodstuffs, thence to the skeleton where they become deposited preferentially at the sites where mineralization is proceeding. He added a footnote stating that ‘As the process of osteogenesis is particularly intensified in the very young, the risk is greater in foetal and neo-natal subjects.’ It was nearly two years after the 1956 Olympics when Marston’s pa per was published, and a year after the British weaponeers shifted their testing ground to Christmas Island, having escalated from atomic to thermonuclear devices. The delay in publication had been caused by the extended review process the paper went through. According to the Royal Commission in 1985 the AWTSC particularly objected to the reference to strontium – It must be pointed out that there is no experimental evidence to support the assertion that either leukaemia or bone cancer are induced by the low [emphasis added] levels of radiostrontium associated with fallout. In fact, Marston had cited the British Medical Research Council’s 1956 White Paper on Hazards[57] which discusses strontium 90 extensively. And Dr Hopper had told the Argus in 1956, If danger there could be, it would be in regard to the strontium content absorbed in the rain. If accumulated in the bones in suf ficient strength, it could cause cancer. But it