16 January 2001

UK Note on Depleted Uranium THE RISKS The UK Ministry of Defence has always been clear that DU could represent a low level hazard. It is a heavy metal with chemical toxicity risks similar to lead. It is radioactive and presents a low level radiological hazard. It is 40% less radioactive than natural uranium. A MOD Memorandum from 1979, produced to explain the need for a test firing programme is clear about the toxic and radioactive risk. The need for appropriate safety measures has been appreciated throughout the firing programme. We first published data on DU in 1993 after its use in the Gulf War. It is entirely wrong to suggest that MOD'S view on the risks, and on safety have been inconsistent over the years or that warnings were ignored. Uranium is present in the earth's crust, in seawater, in food and drinking water. All of us are exposed to it every day. Other sources of ionising radiation are present in our everyday lives. Examples include natural radiation from soil and rocks, cosmic rays from space, and artificial radiation sources such as domestic smoke detectors. Depleted Uranium had been handled and machined in the UK safely for years for use in a variety of civil applications, before the Ministry of Defence began its DU weapon development programme in 1979. It is, for example, used as radiation shielding in hospital radiotherapy departments, in shielding containers for radioactive sources, and in the manufacture of counter balance weights for yacht and aircraft. THE HEALTH EFFECTS There has been substantial speculation about the health effects which DU might have had on the health of UK veterans from the Gulf, and Allied veterans from the Balkans. Much of the speculation has been just that. We need to look at facts. Soluble DU, if ingested in large quantities can cause either acute or chronic damage to the kidneys - like other heavy metal poisoning. There was no evidence at the time of the campaigns of acute toxicity to the kidneys of any British forces in these theatres. There has been no subsequent evidence of chronic kidney damage attributable to DU intake. A number of Gulf veterans who have been to our Medical Assessment do have kidney damage, but in every case it has been attributed to other specific diseases. There has been no published research on Gulf health which links Gulf illnesses to heavy metal poisoning. Insoluble DU, if inhaled, can lodge in the lungs, and presents a source of radiation which might increase the lifetime risk of contracting cancers. This risk is very low. We have published estimates of this risk for possible scenarios in the Gulf War. If a soldier spent some 2 to 3 hours inside a DU contaminated tank on dust-raising activities, without precautions they might receive a radiation dose of 2- 3 millisieverts. This compares to an average annual dose to the UK population from all sources of 2.6 milliseiverts. There are wide variations. In Cornwall the dose is 8 millisieverts because of the local geology. According to the International Commission on Radiological Protection the additional dose of 2 - 3 milliseiverts could generate an increased lifetime risk of cancer of 12 in 100,000. This calculation will of course only apply to a very few troops whose duties require this sort of activity, for whom we issued guidance about risks and protective measures both in the Gulf and in Kosovo. It was a worst-case estimate. More recent work published by the United States just before Christmas estimates the potential exposure in this sort of scenario as much lower. Whilst the risk of contracting cancer from increased radiation exposures exists, there has been no medical evidence which actually links DU or uranium to cancers in humans. This is the universal conclusion of recent comprehensive reviews of the medical literature published by the RAND Corporation, by the United States Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, and most recently by the prestigious United States Institute of Medicine. They concluded in September 2000 that there was evidence of no link existing between DU and Lung Cancer at low levels of exposure, and between DU and clinically significant renal dysfunction. They also concluded that there was inadequate or insufficient evidence to link DU to a range of other cancers, nervous system disease, respiratory disease and other health outcome. We support this data with the figures on Gulf veteran mortality which we have been regularly monitoring. Up to 30 June 2000 452 Gulf veterans had died of all causes, compared to 439 in a control group. Of these, 156 had died of disease - compared to 190 in the control group. It is, therefore, simply untrue that Gulf veterans have evidence of excess cancer. Of those, 64 Gulf veterans had died of all forms of cancer. 68 of the control group had died of all forms of cancer. Our latest figures are 69 Gulf deaths from cancer, and 77 era deaths. In both groups the prevalence of cancer was substantially less than would be expected in similar sized groups of the civil population in England and Wales (100-120 deaths). The research at Baltimore Veterans Affairs clinic into 33 US servicemen exposed to the highest risk of DU during the Gulf War further confirms this. Some of these have DU shrapnel embedded in their bodies and excrete many times the normal background levels of uranium. Yet there is no evidence in any of them so far that their medical problems are linked to DU. UK forces personnel, who have served in the Gulf or the Balkans, cannot have had anything approaching the DU exposure of this particular US group. THE ENVIRONMENT Some commentators are suggesting that there are risks to populations including in the United Kingdom from the dispersal of DU dust. These suggestions are unscientific and irresponsible. The facts do not support the existence of such risks. The United States has done extensive monitoring of the soil at a number of sites in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, over a number of years from 1991 to 1996. Of 300 samples analysed only 3 had DU in detectable quantities, two at the site of a major fire involving DU ammunition, and one in the scrap heap where Iraqi armoured vehicles were collected. Even this last measurement was tiny - three times below the level at which the land would have been returned to civilian use. In the UK we regularly monitor the sites where DU was test fired, and annual reports are published. Furthermore, independent environmental consultants have undertaken studies to confirm the safety of those ranges, and their environs. Their conclusion was that activities at both Eskmeals and Kirkcudbright produced a negligible impact on the local environment. The fact is that there is no evidence of contamination from DU dust outside the boundary of the Eskmeals range: indeed the detectable contamination is confined to the immediate area of the firing target, which is a Controlled Area in terms of the Ionising Radiation Regulations 2000. At Kirkcudbright where rounds are fired into the sea, monitoring has so far detected no effect above the background levels of radioactive material present naturally in sea water. Following a fire at the Royal Ordnance in Featherstone significant testing of the site was undertaken by the National Radiological Protection Board. The sampling area was extensive, A report was issued on 1 February 2000 confirming that there had been no contamination of the site or the surrounding area by depleted uranium or combustible products of uranium. UK Delegation to NATO 16 January 2001