Executive Summary

ENVIRONMENTAL RADIATION FROM NUCLEAR REACTORS
AND INCREASING CHILDREN'S CANCER

IN SOUTHEASTERN FLORIDA
A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE FLORIDA BABY TOOTH STUDY

By

The Radiation and Public Health Project
  Miami, Florida March 28, 2001
 http://www.radiation.org/floridateeth.html
 

RPHP Research Associates
Jay M. Gould, Ph.D., Director
Ernest J. Sternglass, Ph.D., Chief Scientist Jerry Brown, Ph.D.
Joseph Mangano, MPH, MBA
William McDonnell, MA
Marsha Marks, ACSW, LCSW
Janette Sherman, MD

  EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

  Operations at the four nuclear reactors in southeastern Florida (Turkey Point 3 and 4, and St. Lucie 1 and
2) have added considerable radioactivity to the local environment, raising concerns of whether local
residents have been harmed. The Radiation and Public Health Project (RPHP) research group has
investigated this issue, and has documented facts that suggest such harm is occurring. A number of these
findings have been published in peer-reviewed medical journals.

Radioactivity Emissions, Environmental Levels, In-body Levels

From 1970-87, Turkey Point and St. Lucie emitted 10.39 trillion picocuries of radioactivity into the air.
From 1985 to 1995, the level of radioactive chemicals in Miami precipitation remained constant, suggesting
that a current source of emissions (nuclear power reactors) was supplementing and offsetting the decay of
fallout from old atomic bomb tests.

Similarly, concentrations of radioactive Strontium-90 in 86 Dade County baby teeth tested by RPHP have
been rising since the early 1980s. The current level is equal to that in the late 1950s, when the U.S. and the
Soviet Union conducted large-scale nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere.
Dade County and other southeastern Florida baby teeth have the highest levels of radioactive Strontium-90,
a known carcinogen, than anywhere in the U.S. where baby teeth have been studied. In addition, the area
also has a rate of childhood cancer that is considerably higher than the US average.

Health Effects

Since the 1950s, breast cancer mortality rose significantly in the counties near the Turkey Point and St.
Lucie reactors (up 26% near Turkey Point, up 55% near St. Lucie, compared to a 1% US increase).
From the early 1980s to the early 1990s, cancer incidence in children under 10 rose 35.2% in five
southeastern Florida counties, compared to a 10.8% rise in the US Children are especially sensitive to the
carcinogenic effects of radioactivity.

.These five southeastern Florida counties are: Broward, Dade, Martin, Palm Beach, and St. Lucie.
In the same period, from the early 1980s to the early 1990s, an enormous 325.3% increase in childhood
cancer took place in St. Lucie County, increasing the current rate in this area to more than double the
national average.

In the 1990s, the cancer death rate in young adults age 15-34 in these five southeastern Florida counties
has risen, in contrast to a decline in the US Increases were particularly large for breast cancer and bone
and blood cancers, each especially sensitive to radioactivity.
In Dade County, childhood cancer rises after radioactivity levels in precipitation rise, and declines after
levels drop. This is strong evidence that exposure to radioactivity is one cause of childhood cancer in
southeastern Florida.

Opening and Closing Reactors

In 1983-84, when the Turkey Point reactors were mostly closed for repairs, infant deaths in Broward and
Dade Counties fell 19.1%, compared to only 6.4% in the US The following two years, when Turkey Point
returned to full power, the local infant death rate rose 1.2%.
In 1983-84, the first two years that the St. Lucie 2 reactor operated, infant deaths in St. Lucie County rose
35.3%.
These findings are consistent with the large declines in infant deaths near eight out of eight US reactors
that closed since 1987.

Recommendations

The recent evidence suggesting that radioactive chemicals emitted from Turkey Point and St. Lucie are
one cause of rising cancer rates in southeastern Florida is significant and merits more detailed study.
The Tooth Fairy Project will provide critical data on levels of in-body radioactivity, which will allow
researchers to better understand the link between environmental radiation and cancer, especially in young
persons. The Project is especially important in southeastern Florida, which has the highest levels of Sr-90 in
baby teeth of any US area analyzed to date and above-average childhood cancer rates.
Information on the radiation-cancer link should be considered in federal policies regulating the operation of
nuclear reactors, in southeastern Florida and across the US.
Information on the radiation-cancer link should be considered in the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's
environmental review of utility applications to renew and extend the licenses of aging nuclear power plants
in Florida and across the US.