07/05/2016 / By Vicki Batts
It’s not a secret that radiation pollution is hard to contain. The United States Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, began releasing data detailing the continuing rise of radiation contamination in our own food supply following Fukushima. Milk and water samples from across the U.S. have been testing positive for a number of different radioactive elements such as Iodine-131, Cesium-134 and Cesium-137 in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear fallout. In April 2011, several water supplies in the U.S. tested positive for Iodine-131. Three milk samples also tested positive for the same element at amounts above the EPA’s maximum levels for safety. It is also important to note that the EPA is only testing for Iodine-131 in the water supply, even though there are countless other radioactive products continually being omitted by Fukushima such as plutonium, cesium and uranium.
None of these are being tested for, even though they are far deadlier than Iodine-131. If that isn’t unsettling enough, Natural News reported in 2011 that 23 water supplies across the United States have tested positive for Iodine-131, with the contamination reaching from California to New York. One can only imagine how high the contamination levels would be if the EPA were to test for all potential radioactive elements, and not just one. Water may be the least of our worries, given that three milk supplies from Arkansas, Arizona, and Hawaii all exhibited exceedingly high levels of the radioactive Iodine-131. Well above the EPA safety limits, the levels of radioactive material in these milks should have raised concerns, but what else do you expect from a government agency? The EPA continues to tell everyone things are just fine, even when they’re not.
If things are “just fine,” why has the EPA drawn up a new proposal that would permit an amount of radiation in our drinking water that would be equivalent to 250 chest x-rays in one year? Eco Watch reports that in early June 2016, the EPA quietly issued several proposals that would allow radiation contamination levels in drinking water that are far and beyond what the Safe Drinking Water Act currently allows. With a name that gives their sinister motives an artificially sweet facade, the EPA’s “Protective Action Guidelines” would serve to increase the amount of radioactive elements allowed in our water supply by thousands. Radioactive Iodine-131, for example, is currently not to exceed 3 pico curries per liter (pCi/L). Under the new guidelines, up to 10,350 pCi/L would be acceptable. That is 3,450 times higher than the current acceptable amount. Don’t you think that would be toxic? If your answer is “yes” — you would be correct. Leukemia-causing strontium-90 would be granted a 925-fold increase, with the allowable limit being raised from 8 pCi/L to to 7,400 pCi/L.
Why the EPA would not only permit, but actively seek to promote such contamination in the water supply is beyond comprehension. All radionuclides cause cancer — there is no truly safe limit. But to essentially give a free pass to water pollution, and endanger the lives of people across the nation? Outrage, anger, and pure disgust are just a few of the adjectives that the American people should be using to describe their feelings about this over-inflated government agency. If you want clean water and organic food that won’t give you cancer, you are going to have to do it yourself.
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