Navajo uranium miners: US human radiation experiments

Here's a scientific study showing that Navajos were secretly used as human uranium experiments by the US during the Cold war. A large number died.

"Uranium miners were unwilling and unaware victims of human experimentation to evaluate the health effects of radiation."

NEW SOLUTIONS: A Journal of Environmental and Occupational Health Policy; Baywood Publishing Company; Issue: Volume 9, Number 2 / 1999; Pages: 163 - 178

Observational Studies as Human Experimentation: The Uranium Mining Experience in the Navajo Nation (1947-66)
Rafael Moure-Eraso

Abstract:
This article evaluates how an observational epidemiologic study of federal agencies in uranium miners became an experiment of opportunity for radiation effects. Navajo miners and communities suffered environmental exposures caused by the practices of uranium mining and milling in the Navajo reservation during the 1947 to 1966 period. A historical review of the state-of-the-art knowledge of the health effects of uranium mining and milling during the years prior to 1947 was conducted. Contemporary prevention and remediation practices also were assessed. An appraisal of the summary of findings of a comprehensive evaluation of radiation human experimentation conducted by the U.S. federal government in 1995-96 (ACHRE) demonstrates that uranium miners, including Navajo miners, were the single group that was put more seriously at risk of harm from radiation exposures, with inadequate disclosure and often with fatal consequences. Uranium miners were unwilling and unaware victims of human experimentation to evaluate the health effects of radiation. The failure of the State and U.S. Governments to issue regulations or demand installation of known mine-dust exposure control measures caused widespread environmental damage in the Navajo Nation.
PHOTO -- BURNED BY THE ORE: Gilbert Badoni, Navajo, with photo of his family when he was young, all family members developed cancer after father worked in the uranium mines. After his father's death, Badoni became outspoken about uranium mining effects. "We were used as guinea pigs," Badoni said. Badoni's home in Cudei, NM, near Shiprock on the Navajo Nation, still has radioactive rocks in his back yard. Photo Brenda Norrell