Yahoo
Wednesday April 11, 03:45 PM
Britain to screen military for depleted uranium
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/010411/80/bjyns.html

 LONDON (Reuters) - Britain has moved a step closer to screening military personnel exposed to depleted uranium.

 In a second consultative document, the Ministry of Defence has included a plan to offer urine testing to assess past exposure to DU, which is used in armour-busting weapons.

 Controversy over the use of DU weapons by NATO in the Balkans in 1999 erupted after reports from Italy that six of its soldiers died of leukaemia after Balkan peacekeeping duty.

 But the United Nations Environmental Programme last month concluded in a report that health hazards from DU exposure "appeared minimal".

 The screening tests will be made available on demand to British servicemen and MoD employees who served in the Gulf or the Balkans, the ministry said.

 The ministry also called for an oversight board which would allow veterans to assist in developing an "effective and validated screening programme".

 Once the results of the urine tests and study are available the ministry said, a permanent mass testing programme may be established as well as biological monitoring of those assessed at risk from DU exposure.

 Minister for Veterans Lewis Moonie said the second phase of consultation underlined the government's commitment "to addressing the issues openly".

 "We are using the best scientific and medical advice and techniques that are available to develop an appropriate test to address the concerns of our people and their families," Moonie said.


Comment:
 
     Urine testing for DU oxides via inhalation is not a good test, as the lung lymph system can be in toxic overload the urine not register much at all.
 
     The problem being that the immune system pull the toxic materials into the stationary macrophages in the lymph nodes and damages their mitochondria.
 
 This sets off the Th1 response in the secretory macrophages that sets off apoptosis in other critical immune cells and corrective Th2 from other parts of the body.   This is a key pathogen destruction function and this allows various virals to also begin to appear and these also cause cytokine responses and impair apoptosis.    A wide range of diseases then appear based part on exposure histories, DNA endogenous virals, etc.   This mechanism for DU is the same as other toxic compenents from the GW and they all add together to poison this critical immune function, which is what is termed the GWS.