Radioactive isotope and toxin testing needed for seafood

To the editor:

In the article by David Jolly of The New York Times printed in the Anchorage Daily News Oct. 22, it says that “in 2012, Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute created its own label in collaboration with Irish group, Global Trust, reasoning, the state’s reputation for sustainable fishing was good enough.”

The problem is that “sustainable fishing” is not the only issue for certification of seafood. Steven Mufson reported (Oct. 3, Washington Post) that six single-shell tanks and a double-shell tank are leaking highly radioactive isotopes and horribly toxic chemicals from Hanford, Wash., nuclear waste dump into groundwater (which goes into our Pacific Ocean). The clean-up date there has just been pushed from 2020 to 2040, which means to me that most of their 177 tanks have corroded and may leak, soon.

The Nome Nugget reported (Sept. 12) from Barents Observer, “Radioactive strontium-90 sources (two with about 50,000 Curie each) have likely washed out to sea ... and (one) missing generator was located ... on Kamchatka Peninsula” (right across from Nome). Strontium-90 is deposited and concentrated in our bones and radiates beta particles from inside us for the rest of our lives, which causes bone cancer.

And, where do you think Russian and U.S. nuclear ships and submarines dump their radioactive wastes, such as cobalt-60, and even “hot” nuclear reactors? Together with an ongoing flowing of radioactive isotopes into the ocean from Fukushima, Japan, we see that radioactive and toxic chemical contamination of our Pacific Ocean is increasing.

The North Pacific Ocean current carries salmon, smelt and other baby fish, juvenile crabs and seafood down through the Bering Strait and along the Aleutians directly toward Fukushima, Japan, then straight to Seattle and up Alaska’s coast, and so on round and round. Since fish and whales concentrate contaminants in their tissues, and since we concentrate them further in our tissues and milk, we should ask our state government to provide radioactive isotope and toxin testing facilities to eliminate contaminated seafood in order to allow Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute to certify Alaska seafood as safe, rather than “good enough.”

Daniel N. Russell

Willow