Before It’s News – by Deborah Dupree
Approximately 70,000 American troops have been radiation poisoned for their humanitarian aid to Fukushima survivors after believing related nuclear industry and government lies, including that low-level radiation is not harmful to human health, according to an attorney last week who is representing the Navy in a lawsuit.
“They’ve got leukemia, they have growths, they’re undergoing surgery to remove lesions in their brains, a couple of them have had them and have lost the sight in their eye,” Attorney Paul C. Garner said in a Nuke Radio interview last week.
Garner is representing U.S. service members in Japan after March 11 during the humanitarian Operation Tomodachi.
(See: US Navy sailors sue Japan for radiation fraud)
“One guy has testicular cancer. He was aboard the Reagan,” Garner said. “He’s 21. He had one of his testicles removed already.”
Garner was speaking to Christina Consolo on Nuked Radio, an internet radio program that began on the 1-year anniversary of Fukushima, and now airs 2 days each week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
The nuclear industry catastrophe occurred March 13, 2011 when a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami struck the area of Japan that is home to the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant.
Operation Tomodachi was a humanitarian mission conducted in Japan after the massive quake, tsunami, and nuclear catastrophe began and lasted 80 days.
“70,000 US servicemen and women from the Navy, Airforce, Army & Marines delivered food, blankets & water in areas of devastation,” explains Consolo. “What they didn’t know was the severity of radiation exposure they received since TEPCO refused to acknowledge the extent of what was happening at the Fukushima plant.
“A registry was created to track subsequent health problems by the Department of Defense, but that program was recently abandoned,” Consolo says. “As many servicemen and women have already begun to exhibit severe health issues a lawsuit was filed in San Diego Federal Court against TEPCO by Environmental Law Attorney Paul Garner, to establish a medical fund for the servicemen and women who were involved in this operation as well as their families in Japan.”
Consolo spoke with Mike Seybourn about what it was like to work in a highly radioactive environment and what the future might hold for him and his family in terms of health, a distubing discussion.
The ‘no-harm low-level radiation’ lie that keeps on killing
“You know what their talking points are, the Tepco people and those in power?” Garner asked Consolo, also now known as RadChick. “It’s all low-level radiation, nothing to worry about. It’s too little to worry about.”
Prominent human rights defenders and scientists have expressed outrage over the Fukushima lies by industry and government since the catastrophe began. These include a long list, including people such as Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth, Dr. Alexey Yablokov, Dr. Helen Coldicott, Arnie Gundersen of Fairwinds, and Dr. Mark Sircus.
(See: Nuclear whistleblowers: Stop lying about Fukushima, and Radiating Americans: Fukushima rain, Clinton’s secret food pact, and Experts: Fukushima ‘off-scale’ lethal radiation level infers millions dying, and Am women pay high price for Fukushima cover-up: 35% more dead babies, and Fukushima worst confirmed, radiated children need evacuation)
Each of the above-listed rights defenders and scientists and many others have repeatedly warned that consequences of the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan is comparable to or potentially greater than health and environmental consequences of the Chernobyl reactor explosion on April 26, 1986 in Ukraine.
“If they get away with this then what did we fight Watergate for?” Garner asked Consolo.
The independent nuclear specialists have warned that long-term risk of radiation due to internal exposure would be worse due to lies and cover-up of the catastrophe presently used to protect the nuclear energy industry.
After over a year of that lying about the hazard of low-level radiation, as the U.S. government also has, last October, TEPCO acknowledged it had played down safety risks at the facility “out of fear that they would lead to a plant shutdown,” CNN reported.
The United Nations has also been complicit.
At a press conference almost two years ago, in March 2011, Dr. Yablokov, who had been holding a daily vigil in front of the World Health Organization headquarters due to its alleged false reporting of Chernobyl, explained:
“We are seeing something that has never happened… a multiple reactor catastrophe including one using plutonium fuel as well as spent fuel pool accidents, all happening within 200 kilometers of a metropolis of 30 million people. Because the area is far more densely populated than around Chernobyl, the human toll could eventually be far worse in Japan.”
“The World Health Organization cannot make any comment or decision regarding nuclear energy without deferring to the International Atomic Energy Agency which actively promotes nuclear power,” according to Beyond Blue.
Words of warning by Fukushima whistleblowers seemingly fell on deaf ears of the pubic and all of those government agencies meant to protect the public, in Japan and in the U.S.
Garner described to CNN in December the illnesses as “major health issues.”
“Our best and brightest — who were hired to perform top service to our Navy — went there to provide humanitarian tasks and did not want to bargain their health and well being,” Garner told Consolo. “But the people running the power plant lied to them.”
The suit against Tokyo Electric Power Company alleged a series of failures, including lying. It was filed Dec. 21 in U.S. District Court Southern District of California, alleging that the sailors — among some 5,500 who were aboard the USS Ronald Reagan providing humanitarian aid to the stricken zone – were sickened from exposure to radiation that escaped from the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant.
“The Plaintiffs must now endure a lifetime of radiation poisoning and suffering which could have and should have been avoided,” Gardner said.
The question remains regarding how many other unwitting individuals will suffer from lies about radiation, not only from Fukushima and other nuclear energy facilities, but also from the fossil fuel industry that is continually exposing the public to radiation that is also “played down” – lied about.
Note: If the reader was involved in Operation Tomodachi and hase questions or concerns about personal health status, contact Paul Garner at 760.600.0081 or email him at pcg@garnerlaw.com or his associate daryljbrooks@roadrunner.com.
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