Fallout & remedies
Those of you living in or who grew up in the Los Angeles area may find the following of interest. In 1954, when I was 9 and living in Pasadena, CA, a tremendous amount of radioactive crud was dumped on the West Coast of the USA courtesy of the thermonuclear test Castle-Bravo, which took place on March 1 of that year. By May 1954 the fallout from that 15-megaton shot had reached the West Coast of North and South America, and was continuing on around the Northern Hemisphere as well.
That same month I came down with ailments that nobody in the area had ever seen: first, for two weeks, I was weak and nauseated, with diarrhea. That cleared up, but then my fingernails and toenails got all bloody and fell out, with brand-new, embryonic ones underneath, and the skin at my fingertips peeled off, revealing embryonically new and tender skin underneath. Nobody knew what it was. The GP who checked me over thought it was due to an allergy to vitamin C, and told my adoptive parents not to let me eat oranges (!).
That same month, Paddy, the family cat, who was 17 and had theretofore never been sick a day in her life, also came down with an ailment: she had more and more trouble breathing, as if something were clogging her throat. Which was the case. The vet told my adoptive parents that she had popcorn lymphoma all up an down her throat, and that the best thing they could do for her was euthanize her, because there was no known treatment for it then. He also wept as he told them that that month, all over Los Angeles County, his colleagues had seen hundreds of cases of strange and deadly illnesses among pets, stock animals, and work animals, things that they knew of, if at all, from ancient textbooks or hearsay from older vets, and, in most cases, had no idea how to treat.
And people were coming down with cancer, heart attacks, and other deadly conditions all over the L.A. Basin, and nobody knew why. And for 20+ years after that there was a spike in rates of such illnesses among humans and nonhuman animals in that area, and again, nobody knew why, as the media were strangely silent about it. The claims was made that it was all due to "better reporting" (Hah!). At age 16, I suddenly developed acute Graves' Disease, thyrotoxicosis, and exophthalmic goiter, and had to have 7/8 of my thyroid removed -- what remained was as large as a normal thyroid, and slightly hyperactive. Other children all over the L.A. Basin experienced the same thing.
At age 26, I finally met some people working in radiation medicine, with whom I discussed my medical history. They told me that my symptoms over the years were archetypal signs of radiation sickness, and that it was probably from fallout from one or another nuclear test by the US, drifting into the L.A. area. And a few years ago I finally learned which test had likely done it: Castle Bravo, out in the Marshall Islands, because it was so huge and the wind set wrong that day and all that fallout came directly toward North and South America, then went on to hit lots of other places.
About the same time, someone turned me on to books by nutritionist Adelle Davis, such as her Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit and Let's Get Well. I had had a 3-pack-a-day Marlborough habit for 9 years by then, and I had also been born and grew up in the Los Angeles area at a time when smog was often so heavy and dark and nasty you literally couldn't see across the street. So I memorized her books, figured out what was good for burns -- fallout, cigarettes, and smog burn and poison you from the inside out -- and started taking vitamin E by the ton, vitamins A and C in megadoses, and everything else that I really needed to recover my health, which wasn't good. In 1982, I did quit smoking for good, and I moved away from the L.A. area at age 17, but the damage had been done, as had that from fallout. Yet I'm 66 years old and still here, when lots of people I went to school with, many of their parents, and lots of other people had died of the sort of things that fallout poisoning can cause. So *something* worked.
If you or anyone you know is interested in learning more about this, especially if you or they have lived in Southern California, let me know and I'll be happy to tell you what I can.
That same month I came down with ailments that nobody in the area had ever seen: first, for two weeks, I was weak and nauseated, with diarrhea. That cleared up, but then my fingernails and toenails got all bloody and fell out, with brand-new, embryonic ones underneath, and the skin at my fingertips peeled off, revealing embryonically new and tender skin underneath. Nobody knew what it was. The GP who checked me over thought it was due to an allergy to vitamin C, and told my adoptive parents not to let me eat oranges (!).
That same month, Paddy, the family cat, who was 17 and had theretofore never been sick a day in her life, also came down with an ailment: she had more and more trouble breathing, as if something were clogging her throat. Which was the case. The vet told my adoptive parents that she had popcorn lymphoma all up an down her throat, and that the best thing they could do for her was euthanize her, because there was no known treatment for it then. He also wept as he told them that that month, all over Los Angeles County, his colleagues had seen hundreds of cases of strange and deadly illnesses among pets, stock animals, and work animals, things that they knew of, if at all, from ancient textbooks or hearsay from older vets, and, in most cases, had no idea how to treat.
And people were coming down with cancer, heart attacks, and other deadly conditions all over the L.A. Basin, and nobody knew why. And for 20+ years after that there was a spike in rates of such illnesses among humans and nonhuman animals in that area, and again, nobody knew why, as the media were strangely silent about it. The claims was made that it was all due to "better reporting" (Hah!). At age 16, I suddenly developed acute Graves' Disease, thyrotoxicosis, and exophthalmic goiter, and had to have 7/8 of my thyroid removed -- what remained was as large as a normal thyroid, and slightly hyperactive. Other children all over the L.A. Basin experienced the same thing.
At age 26, I finally met some people working in radiation medicine, with whom I discussed my medical history. They told me that my symptoms over the years were archetypal signs of radiation sickness, and that it was probably from fallout from one or another nuclear test by the US, drifting into the L.A. area. And a few years ago I finally learned which test had likely done it: Castle Bravo, out in the Marshall Islands, because it was so huge and the wind set wrong that day and all that fallout came directly toward North and South America, then went on to hit lots of other places.
About the same time, someone turned me on to books by nutritionist Adelle Davis, such as her Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit and Let's Get Well. I had had a 3-pack-a-day Marlborough habit for 9 years by then, and I had also been born and grew up in the Los Angeles area at a time when smog was often so heavy and dark and nasty you literally couldn't see across the street. So I memorized her books, figured out what was good for burns -- fallout, cigarettes, and smog burn and poison you from the inside out -- and started taking vitamin E by the ton, vitamins A and C in megadoses, and everything else that I really needed to recover my health, which wasn't good. In 1982, I did quit smoking for good, and I moved away from the L.A. area at age 17, but the damage had been done, as had that from fallout. Yet I'm 66 years old and still here, when lots of people I went to school with, many of their parents, and lots of other people had died of the sort of things that fallout poisoning can cause. So *something* worked.
If you or anyone you know is interested in learning more about this, especially if you or they have lived in Southern California, let me know and I'll be happy to tell you what I can.