Royal Society warns of risks from depleted uranium

Urgent attention must be paid to the health and environmental consequences from the depleted uranium used in many of the munitions fired in Iraq, the Royal Society has warned.

The society has publicly backed the United Nations Environment Programme's call for a scientific assessment of sites struck with depleted uranium weapons, the immediate distribution of guidelines to minimise the risk of exposure, and the need to clean up remnants.

The Ministry of Defence insists that the effects of depleted uranium are strictly localised. But after growing concern over the risk of cancer, testing is now available to all troops that served in Iraq. Previous guidelines recommended monitoring personnel only “where they have been exposed to depleted uranium or where there is a high probability that they have been so exposed.”

In its new study on Iraq the UN Environment Programme states: “The intensive use of depleted uranium weapons has likely caused environmental contamination of as yet unknown levels or consequences.”

The programme recently discovered leaching of depleted uranium into the water supply in Bosnia, seven years after the conflict there. It urges immediate access for monitoring teams.

The Royal Society has long been calling for further research into depleted uranium, and it cautions that soldiers and civilians may have been exposed to dangerous levels, contradicting defence minister Geoff Hoon's assurance that there was “not the slightest scientific evidence” to suggest that depleted uranium left a poisonous residue.

Professor Brian Spratt, of the society's depleted uranium working group, said: “It is highly unsatisfactory to deploy a large amount of material that is weakly radioactive and chemically toxic without knowing how much soldiers and civilians have been exposed to it.”

The society estimates that 340 tonnes of depleted uranium were fired in the 1991 Gulf war. It says, “The coalition needs to make clear where and how much depleted uranium was used in the recent conflict in Iraq. We need this information to identify civilians and soldiers who should be monitored for depleted uranium exposure and to begin a clean up of the environment.”

Few troops were likely to be exposed to dangerous levels, says the society. “However, a small number of soldiers might suffer kidney damage and an increased risk of lung cancer if substantial amounts of depleted uranium are breathed in, for instance inside an armoured vehicle hit by a depleted uranium penetrator.”

Warning that fragments of depleted uranium penetrators are “potentially hazardous,” the society says that residential areas should be a particular priority.

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