The Britannica, like the RAND report, is most important for what it did not say about DU.     Neither appear to discuss the immune system and lymph system effect, and yes, there is much to add.  Industry and medicine alike don't like to talk about the cellular immune problem or provide research on that topic.

    We all know DU gets into lungs as a very very fine respirable dust from the solid metal penatrator's heat of reaction with steel armour, its pyrophoric.     The resulting DU dust is so fine it is easily airborne and just walking thru it sturs up enough to cause problem with getting into people.   The DU dusts are mostly oxides and very very insoluble, so they tend to persist in the lung and be hard to remove.

    Many studies point to the fact that DU harms cell DNA, from both toxic metal and radiation oxidant type effects, and this is important as this will trigger the lung's immune defenses.   This is the part that RAND and Britannica omit and its the key to the health effects.    Cells harmed by toxics, be they heavy metal, radiation's peroxides, or fluorides, make a immune signalling substance called TNF-a [Tumor Necrosis Factor-alpha].

This substance emitted by the cells triggers the immune system to send in killer T-cells to kill damaged cells and then macrophages to clean up the mess, like little pack man eater cells.    These actions not only clean up the dead cells mess, but also pick up the actual fine DU oxides particles and carry them back to the lymph nodes where they resist being digested and linger there for very long times as well.   There begins a more severe problem.    Here is where the damage to the bodies cellular immunity begins, as the DU toxic effects shuts down the actions of macrophages, a very important part of cellular immunity.   What it basically means is the main digester part of the immune system is shut down and toxic and other substances cannot be neutralized via digestion mechanisms.    This means the lungs cells can no longer be policed and protected from other toxic compounds, viral, bacterial, fungal, and microplasma exposures and the resultant persistent infections will cause disease of their own, principly by waste products damage to cells.

   The above mechanism is what the RAND report and have not read all the Britannica site, but it likely omits this effect as well.    In a recent UK report the effect of plutonium is well shown to bioconcentrate in the lymph nodes, http://www.llrc.org/durs.htm

  Photo of a large particle trapped in lung tissues is shown, and smaller particles can be taken by macrophages to the lymph system.  Near the bottom is discusses the lymph node concentration effects.   The lymph node damage effect is important for the induction of all cancers, for they cannot exist without the lymph system first being damaged.   Plutonium in lung is highly effective at damaging local tissues and setting off the immune effects, which moves plutonium to lymph nodes and damages the cellular immunity.   When the cellular immunity is very damaged the cancer cells formed by the radiation can take off and proliferate, usually helped along with increased circulation that was designed to push in more immune cells that are too damaged to work due to lymph cell damage.   So, the cancer cells which act much like cancer virals prolifeate at high rates and the person can soon die.

   This same mechanism can be seen with non-rad metals also, as something very similar happens with a metal called beryllium.    Working beryllium often makes very fine oxides that lodge in lungs as well.    Beryiium is extremely toxic to cells and quickly sets off the cell damage and TNF-a, which causes lymphocites to proliferate to destroy the damaged cells and remove the toxic materials.    Here again these actions remove these very insoluble beryllium particles to lymph nodes and the immune cell digestion mechanism shuts down.     As it progresses the lung is not cleaned up and slowly the lungs cells become more and more harmed and the next move is the lung begins to calcify areas to wall off the damaged cells and polutants.   With long term effect this literally turns the lungs into stone.

    A very similar effect is seen with cigarette smoking, where lungs get exposed to Po-210 and cadmium metal, and with age the lower part of persons lungs turn hard as a rock.   The Po-210 is the result of phosphate fertilizers used on tobacco.  It causes lung doses up in the tens of R per year for smokers and is highly related to the lung cancer process.

    This lymph node protection process has been known since man first was bitten by snakes.    Snake venom travels in the lymph system, as the very some toxic mechanisms seen in the lungs is ignited when a person gets bitten by a snake.   In snake bites one usually wants to restrict the lymph fluid circulation and not the blood system.

   The big thing to notice at this point is many toxins have the abilty to damage cells and set off the immune defenses, and it is very easy to overload this part of the immune system.     Even mother nature can sometimes overload this part of the immune function, and it often happens with age some many natural long retained toxins in the environment, fluorides are the top offender here.   This effect is a strong component in aging.

   With toxic exposure to cell damaging poisons, the lymph system is almost always the cellular system that gets the highest levels of the poison.  It is obviouly the first place to suspect for toxic damage effects, but as one can see its the last place these investigations want to look that seek to promote mystery illnesses.    So, when DU talks about the kidneys cell damage being the indicator, this is not really so, because long before the kidneys are toxically impacted, the lymph system cells in the lungs are highly overloaded with toxic DU.    In simple environments, one can do without cellular immune cells functions for a while, but in a highly complex situation like the GW---with all kinds or bacteria, fungus, miroplasma, and etc. exposures this leads to problems.

  IN situations where precision bombing adds to the level of environmental disaster the lungs become exposed to things like fluorides and chlorides as well, which are extremely long retained compounds in many cases that also highly impair the lymph system.   It is well shown that fluorides exposures slow down the clean out from the body of toxic metals.     Fluorides is one of the industrial toxins that is causing hellacious health effects in the world today.    They were also in the Gulf war as part of nerve gases, used in oil well production and refining.   Inhalled, they also can become stuck in lung tissues, bioconcentrate to lymph nodes, and shut down the cellular immunity digestion mechanism---mainly via damage to mitochondrail DNA.   Then its the same old story, bacteria, virals, fungus, microplasma can begin to take hold in lungs and tissues all around the body and this cause their own diseases.   Even cancers are viral linked and when these viral cells can't be policed, they are free to proliferate.

  The biggest secret in industry and medicine today is this immune system damage component and how easily it is damaged by industrial pollutants. Remember the early study on the GWI folks that showed they aged the equilavent of 30 years based on their health complaints-------this is the effect that causes it.   It is well known inside places like ORNL and its the big unspoken health effect that really everyone should know about.    Knowing about this one pathway mechanism explains away any mystery to what is causing all the GW syndromes, and Bosnia as well.

   DU exposures do add directly to lymphatic system toxic loading and produces a long term impact on the level of immune cellular perpormance and can leads to various immune based diseases, including cancers.

jp