IN AN apparent move at safeguarding its
citizens, the French government began
handing out iodine pills to some
400,000 people living near nuclear
plants in the last week of April. The act
was more significant in the wake of the
10th anniversary of the Chernobyl
nuclear disaster on April 26. Reasoned
Jean Blanc, who is in charge of accident
response in the government's off ice for
protection against radiation, "in
Chernobyl, they were distributing
iodine pills two days after the explosion, much too late". Iodine is the only
known substance which can offer some
amount of protection against deadly
radiation.
While the government move is
being considered ominous in some
circles (a woman staying near a nuclear
plant in Nogent-sur-Seine, about 100
km southeast of Paris, remarked, "it
is very upsetting"), French officials
say that if at all an accident on the
scale of Chernobyl should occur, they
would like citizens to be prepared. The
iodine pills produced by the French
Army's central pharmacy, contains
100 mg of iodine 131 and should be
consumed within an hour of a nuclear
accident.
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