Can someone please explain the risk to my infant
Hi,
I have a formula fed/breastfed infant. What should I be doing to protect her?
Do I need to buy months worth of formula that was produced before the disaster? Do I need to be supplementing her with something? Would you advise keeping her indoors? What about water?
It has been mentioned in previous posts to ask a doctor, but our doctor doesn't know much about protecting small children in a crisis as his response was "There is nothing to worry about"
Infants
There are several things you can do depending on your financial means. For water, Reverse osmosis takes out radioactive particles, but it acidifies the water and my opinion is that it wouldn't be healthy for your infant in the long run. My suggestion right now is to use activated charcoal filters since they adsorb iodine and that's the only radioactive particle found so far in the tap water. It also leaves beneficial minerals in (other than iodine).
According to www.herbalroom.com/radiation brassica vegetables prevent iodine from reaching breast milk (they have a pubmed citation for the statement), though you may have to supplement your infant with a very small amount of iodine if you are blocking it from breast milk. Dr. Horn also has a strategy to inhibit iodine uptake rather than damage your thyroid by taking too much iodine, but its probably not necessary at this point. Actually that site has a lot of recommendations for various herbs and foods that are radioprotective (the site says all info came from peer reviewed studies)
If you're really worried, you can get on a waiting list for a geiger counter.
By the way, although I am a doctor, everyone is individual so definitely discuss with your pediatrician.
Breast Feed, Purified Water, Avoid Most Susceptible Foods
Get yourself the best quality water purifier you can afford. I suggest a Black Berkey. Formula has its own problems; is there a reason you can't breast feed? Limit consumption of the most contaminated/susceptible foods. Buy produce from the southern hemisphere, if possible (lots are imported nowadays).
I've considered these things
I've considered these things too. My strategy was to buy a few gallons of milk to freeze as a buffer in case of unannounced contamination. With this great site we have the knowledge to make decisions about how much risk we wish to allow. Since I-131 has a half life of 8 days, I employ food rotation/aging to minimize my family's risks. I freeze each days milk (from my goats) knowing that any I-131 will decay substantially in a couple of weeks, and we drink from the buffer in the freezer. I believe that my duck eggs are likely more contaminated than milk, since my ducks are grazers, they love the rain, and drink huge amounts of puddle water, so I age their eggs too. Pasture raised eggs stay fresh for months in a cool closet. I date and rotate, using eggs from 3 weeks before. I buy Kerrygold butter, it's pasture raised in Ireland, and made in Summer so it's risk free, and provides your baby a source of needed cholesterol and all the vitamins that come from green pasture. Buying aged cheese is an idea, as it would have to predate the accident. Plain yoghurt keeps refrigerated for months and is easily digested by babys. I have not resorted to painting with iodine, and would further research the side effects before applying it to a baby. I expect that eating sea vegetable or kelp would be a safe way to ensure your milk is bountifully supplied with stable iodine for your baby and hopefully crowd out any traces of bad stuff, but don't go overboard. If there are increasing risks as the drama continues, a breast fed baby will have a better chance at a healthy immune response. Your milk will increase in immune factors as your baby gets older so don't listne to anyone that suggest weaning bc of radiation worries. Staying indoors? -Risky for a growing baby because it leads to Vitamin D deficiency, if the situation becomes more complex and you feel you need to keep the baby indoors, get a good cholecalferol supplement to provide vitamin D-3 for you both. W*mart has 5000iu gelcaps which can be squirted into your baby's mouth after downsizing the dose for her weight. Just do what you can and don't stress the rest. We went thru this in 86 with Chernobyl and that baby grew up fine.
The folks here say they really are not qualified to answer
but they have seemed to repeat what your doctor said and what the government has been saying: "don't worry. the risks are minimal"
That said, there are many websites that have advice re: exposure and preventative methods.
I found this one useful:
http://www.interfaces.com/blog/2011/03/topical-iodine-in-case-of-radioac...
I myself bought povodone iodine, since I could not get the potassium iodine pills, and put some on my kids. I would research this with respect to the age of your child, but I put a small patch 2 inches by two inches with my fingers and rub it in.
I myself would avoid any produce or milk which has recently been produced in regions where there have been spikes in radiation from Fukushima. Water is also potentially a problem and you might consider water bottled before the radiation reached your area or in areas not affected.
Frozen veggies are considered the safest bet as radioactive iodine will not be in produce which was produced before the plume or three months after the plume reached your area. Also, if you use the iodine on your skin or babies skin in small amounts (check with your doctor on this, though, or research it yourself) then you can prevent the uptake into your and the baby's thyroids of radioactive iodine (although if you are breastfeeding I am not certain whether this may affect the amount in you milk if it is passing through your body - so making sure the baby has preventive iodine before you nurse may protect him/her completely from the radioiodine, according to the source I am familiar with).
Since radiocesium will be in the environment for years there is little you can do except eat foods which are less likely to be contaminated (southern hemisphere, frozen/dried/produced before the plume reached us,) but eventually if you are in the path of the cesium your and your baby will be exposed (hopefully the amounts are small and will have small effect, but I am not confident we can rely on that) -- so healthy antioxident rich foods from safer regions would probably be the best bet and when the radiodine has dissipated -- and in a few months milk and cheese etc should be relatively as safe as it is likely to get.
I HOPE the risk estimates are accurate and there is little risk but an ounce of prevention is worth a pount of cure. I believe it was Einstein who said "using nuclear fission is a hell of a way to boil water". Good luck.
I advised my own kids to try to buy fresh produce, meat, fish from the Southern hemisphere for the time being (Chile, Argentina, Latin America).
I am not a doctor but did work at one time with the environmental medicine staff of a nuclear facility assessing risks to workers and treatments for toxic exposures. Obviously check with other medical sources if your doctor's advice is inadequate for you.
Assuming your baby is not
Assuming your baby is not eating foods (doesn't sound like it), just make sure that you are using filtered water when mixing formula. Filtered through activated carbon filter.
Since she is a baby, she won't be crawling around in water outside. There is just minute traces in the air. Stay inside on super rainy/foggy days.
The bigger concern if for you to watch what you eat as your body bioaccumulates stuff.... so make sure that you are drinking good water, avoid milk for now if you ask me, eat organic and do what you can to reduce any accumulation of pesticides and metals. Take quick showers, buy paraban free soaps, etc.
You probably have more to worry about when she moves onto food and we are further into this disaster.
Just my thoughts. Someone might disagree.
Thank you both for your kind
Thank you both for your kind responses. She actually is eating food, but I make it myself. She is almost 9 months old. I have also purchase Lugol's iodine just in case.
Great advice to limit exposure to other things that are harmful to health!(I.e. parabans, pesticides)
I hadn't even given that a thought yet. Gives me a little comfort to know she isn't exposed to these things so much.
Best wishes.
Whatever you do, please do
Whatever you do, please do not give iodine to your baby unless under the care of a physician. You could seriously risk causing more harm than good. Stay on top of this side and googling the issue, do what you can to eat well and drink well but if it comes to iodine, your best bet is to administer it with a physician or you could seriously risk injuring your child. Unless there is no time to consult a physician such as the darn thing blowing up and spewing radiation sky high. Yeah, I know they said ti can't but they also said that we were too far away as well.
By all means!!!``
Remember the medical profession's motto: Primum Non Nocere - First Do No Harm.
If you did absolutely nothing; you'd be doing better for your baby than giving iodine in ANY FORM without the express orders of your doctor.
Don't be stampeded by all the moronic and idiotic fear mongers on this site into doing something that is detrimental to your baby.
Mother Nature is still the biggest radiation source to your infant; and there is nothing you can do about that.
HPS
Courtesy of the Health Physics Society at the University of Michigan:
http://www.umich.edu/~radinfo/introduction/radrus.htm
If you can get frozen organic produce
That will not have any of the radionuclides from Fukushima if it was packaged before the plume reached your area.
Fresh produce grown indoors would be much safer than that grown outdoors depending on the source of the water they use anf if it is filtered (which is why I'd recommend frozen not fresh for the time being).
Also, while frozen veggies that are not organic may not be as free of other toxins, at least they will not have the Fukushima radionuclides. Also dried foods such as rice, beans, pasta, etc which are on the shleves now should be free of the radionuclides from Japan if packaged prior to the plume reaching you (if it has).
Obviously using water which is uncontaminated to prepare the food is essential (bottled before the plume reached here or as filtered as possible).
The tap water testing (amd milk/produce) is really important in all of our areas which is why I am so grateful to the Berkeley team, so we can make intelligent and informed decisions to minimize the risk to ourselves and our loved ones.