When Wladimir Wertelecki took the podium at the Fukushima Symposium in New York City he clearly stated that he was presenting breaking news. As this program goes to broadcast in May, 2013, two month after his talk, no major media and no international agency have taken up this report.
Wertelecki presented the results of OMNI-Net Ukraine’s Congenital Malformations Monitoring Program; the results of ten years of scientific study of birth defects of children and their possible relation to ionizing radiation. Since 2000 OMNI-Net scientists have conducted research of the Rivne, Polissia region just north-west of the exploded Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
They found statistically higher than normal incidents of the most heartbreaking birth defects: NTD, Neural Tube Defects of the brain or spinal cord; Anencephaly, where most of the brain and skull do not develop; Microcephaly, a condition in which the circumference of the head and the brain size are smaller than normal.
The data are collected under strict scientific protocols. They are based on a population registry of every baby born in the last ten years with 15,000 measurements; as well as whole body radiation counts that include pregnant women, with a data base of 20,000.
Wladimir Wertelecki was born in Poland in 1936. He trained in pediatrics at Washington University and in Clinical Genetics at the Harvard School of Medicine. From 1968 to 1970 he served as a Senior Surgeon of the United States Public Health Service. From 1974 to 2010 he was chair of the department of medical genetics at the University of South Alabama. Now retired he is dedicated to contributing to a clearer scientific and public understanding of the global impacts of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.
He was recorded on March 12, 2013 at the New York Academy of Medicine. The Fukushima Symposium presented two days of medicine, environmental science and nuclear engineering related to the disaster at Fukushima Daiichi. The Helen Caldicott Foundation organized the event, which was cosponsored by Physicians for Social Responsibility.
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