Depleted uranium

[3] According to an article in Al Jazeera, DU from American artillery is suspected to be one of the major causes of an increase in the general mortality rate in Iraq since 1991.

The United States Navy's Phalanx CIWS's M61 Vulcan Gatling gun used 20 mm armor-piercing penetrator rounds with discarding plastic sabots and a core made using depleted uranium, later changed to tungsten.

[54] A number of anti-war activists specializing in international humanitarian law have questioned the legality of the continued use of depleted uranium weapons, highlighting that the effects may breach the principle of distinction (between civilians and military personnel).

[60] In 2007, France, Britain, the Netherlands, and the Czech Republic voted against a United Nations General Assembly resolution to hold a debate in 2009 about the effects of the use of armaments and ammunitions containing depleted uranium.

[63] In December 2008, 141 states supported a resolution requesting that three UN agencies: United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), WHO and IAEA update their research on the impact of uranium munitions by late 2010—to coincide with the General Assembly's 65th Session, four voted against, 34 abstained and 13 were absent.

[74] Prior to the vote, in a report to the United Nations Secretary General requested by 2012's resolution published in June 2014, Iraq had called for a global treaty ban on depleted uranium weapons.

[82] US Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations at 10 CFR 40.25 establish a general license for the use of depleted uranium contained in industrial products or devices for mass-volume applications.

[96] Militaries have long had risk-reduction procedures for their troops to follow,[97] and studies are in consistent agreement that veterans who used DU-enhanced munitions have not suffered, so far, from an increased risk of cancer (see the Gulf War and Balkans sections below).

As early as 1997, British Army doctors warned the Ministry of Defence that exposure to depleted uranium increased the risk of developing lung, lymph and brain cancer, and recommended a series of safety precautions.

[notes 2] In early 2004, the UK Pensions Appeal Tribunal Service attributed birth defect claims from a February 1991 Gulf War combat veteran to depleted uranium poisoning.

[103][104] Properties such as phase (e.g. particulate or gaseous), oxidation state (e.g. metallic or ceramic), and the solubility of uranium and its compounds influence their absorption, distribution, translocation, elimination and the resulting toxicity.

[118] According to the World Health Organization, radiation dose from DU would be about 60% of that from purified natural uranium with the same mass; the radiological dangers are lower due to its longer half-life and the removal of the more radioactive isotopes.

Surveying the veteran-related evidence pertaining to the Gulf War, a 2001 editorial in the BMJ concluded that it was not possible to justify claims of radiation-induced lung cancer and leukaemia in veterans of that conflict.

A 1999 literature review conducted by the Rand Corporation stated: "No evidence is documented in the literature of cancer or any other negative health effect related to the radiation received from exposure to depleted or natural uranium, whether inhaled or ingested, even at very high doses,"[122] and a RAND report authored by the U.S. Defense department undersecretary charged with evaluating DU hazards considered the debate to be more political than scientific.

"[126] Pier Roberto Danesi, then-director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Seibersdorf +Laboratory, stated in 2002 that "There is a consensus now that DU does not represent a health threat".

[128] A 2005 study by the U.S. Sandia National Laboratories' Al Marshall used mathematical models to analyze potential health effects associated with accidental exposure to depleted uranium during the 1991 Gulf War.

[135] A major 2006 review of peer-reviewed literature by a US Institute of Medicine (IOM) committee concluded that, "[b]ecause the symptoms vary greatly among individuals", they do not point to a syndrome unique to Gulf War veterans, though their report conceded that the lack of objective pre-deployment health data meant definitive conclusions were effectively impossible.

[134][132] Increased rates of immune system disorders and other wide-ranging symptoms, including chronic pain, fatigue and memory loss, have been reported in over one quarter of combat veterans of the 1991 Gulf War.

[141] In early 2004, the UK Pensions Appeal Tribunal Service attributed birth defect claims from a February 1991 Gulf War combat veteran to depleted uranium poisoning.

A laboratory study on rats produced by the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute showed that, after a study period of 6 months, rats treated with depleted uranium coming from implanted pellets, comparable to the average levels in the urine of Desert Storm veterans with retained DU fragments, had developed a significant tendency to lose weight with respect to the control group.

[147] Substantial amounts of uranium were accumulating in their brains and central nervous systems, and showed a significant reduction of neuronal activity in the hippocampus in response to external stimuli.

The researchers say that the most likely remaining causes for GWI are widespread low-level exposure to sarin nerve gas released by the destruction of Iraqi chemical weapons storage facilities in January 1991.

[10] Since 2001, medical personnel working for the Iraqi state health service controlled by Saddam Hussein at the Basra hospital in southern Iraq have reported a sharp increase in the incidence of child leukemia and genetic malformation among babies born in the decade following the Gulf War.

[152][153] In 2003, the Royal Society called for Western militaries to disclose where and how much DU they had used in Iraq so that rigorous, and hopefully conclusive, studies could be undertaken in affected areas.

[160] A 2003 study by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in Bosnia and Herzegovina stated that low levels of contaminant were found in drinking water and air particulate at DU penetrator impact points.

Yet, Pekka Haavisto, chairman of the UNEP DU projects stated, "The findings of this study stress again the importance of appropriate clean-up and civil protection measures in a post-conflict situation.

Zoran Radovanovic, an epidemiologist and the chairman of the Serbian Medical Association's ethics committee, denied that there had been a rise in cancer cases in areas where bombings had taken place.

[166] Depleted uranium has been named as a possible contributing factor to a high incidence of birth defects and cancer near the Salto di Quirra weapons testing range on the Italian island of Sardinia.

[168] On 8 December 1988, an A-10 Thunderbolt II attack jet of the United States Air Force crashed onto a residential area in the city of Remscheid, West Germany.

Local residents and rescue workers complained of various unexplained health issues, which were being attributed to the release of hazardous materials during the crash and subsequent fires.