91 Otchet a naoutchno-issledovatelskoi raboté po klinitcheskim ispyta-niam pektinosoderjachégo préparata iz iablotchnogo chrota “Yablopekt” XD.14.02.002.97, (Report on the scientific research and clinical tests on the apple pectin-based product “Yablopekt” XD.14.02.002.97), Research Institute Oukrpommed, Krivoy Rog (Ukraine), 1997.
Dr Michel Fernex informs us further—The effectiveness of pectin as a food additive resides in the fact that it blocks the absorption of radioactive caesium and strontium in an animal that is eating radioactively contaminated food (as shown by Korzun92 in Kiev). In humans, pectin is also effective in patients who are contaminated but are eating radiologically clean food. This is explained mainly by the fixing of caesium (that is excreted by contaminated patients) in the bile, or in the intestinal lumen. In the absence of effective adsorbents, Cs-137 is reabsorbed into the small intestine and continues to cause damage to the noble organs (endocrine glands, heart and thymus). Adsorbed by oral pectin, the stock of caesium in the body is reduced, radiotoxicity decreases or disappears altogether.
92 “Nutrition problems under wide-scale nuclear accident conditions and its consequences”, International Journal of Radiation Medecine, 1999, 2, (2) : 75–91.
This was demonstrated by Nesterenko and his colleagues in a randomised double-blind, placebo-controlled study of a homogenous group of contaminated children from villages close to Gomel. The children gave their verbal consent after a detailed explanation during a holiday in a sanatorium; their mothers had agreed in a letter. An ethical committee duly monitored and approved the experiment. The results were published in Swiss Medical Weekly and showed that eating clean food for three weeks had reduced the load of caesium-137 in the body by 14%, but levels never fell below 20 Bq/kg, while in the group who ate clean food and also had a teaspoon of pectin before each meal, the burden of Cs 137 was reduced by 63%, and all children had levels below 20 Bq/kg.
A complementary clinical study was undertaken by Nesterenko and Galina Bandazhevskaya, who is a cardiologist, and was the main author of the publication that followed. The real interest of this study was the statistically proven correlation between the Cs-137 load and the symptoms and anomalies found in ECGs. Pectin cures reduce this load, but they also significantly reduce certain clinical symptoms. This study was also published in the Swiss Medical Weekly, a journal that is renowned for the rigour of its peer review. These two studies can be accessed on the site www.smw.ch.
The work undertaken jointly with the German research institute Julich confirmed not only the effectiveness of Belrad’s pectin product but also how well it is tolerated. Emphasis was placed on the stability of microelements in blood plasma, as it had been in a previous study, undertaken by Nika Gres and colleagues in Belarus, that produced similarly positive results.
4. THE GERMAN PROFESSOR DENIGRATES BANDAZHEVSKY
On 6th December 1999, Bandazhevsky is still in prison, awaiting trial.93 A petition has been sent to President Lukashenko from IPPNW Germany defending him. Professor Lengfelder, an influential member of IPPNW, sends a letter to them. He condemns this initiative, describing it as superficial, badly timed, and claims it was inspired by preconceived notions about post-Soviet Belarus. According to Lengfelder, the promoters of the petition, Professor Fernex (President of IPPNW Switzerland at the time) and Gottstein (President of IPPNW Germany at the time), knew nothing about Professor Bandazhevsky, his scientific work, his contacts with the faculty of medicine at Gomel, nor the underlying reasons (Hintergrunde) that led to his trial. Questions needed to be answered: how could this young man, at the age of only 33, during the Soviet epoch, have become professor and rector of a newly founded medical institute at Gomel? “In my view, the idea that it is his anti-nuclear views that have led him to be incarcerated is not realistic”, he wrote. And he went further. The complaint lodged against Bandazhevsky by the State Prosecutor of the Republic said that “…during the selection process for students—the number of candidates being much higher than the places available—his faculty and its directors had accepted payment to take on extra students. The parents, some of whom (etliche) I know personally did not make a fuss, and were only too happy to pay a few hundred or a few thousand dollars, for their child to study there”. One cannot help wondering if Professor Lengfelder—the only person who did not retract his statement—was the perfect witness that the military tribunal had searched for so desperately at the time, and never found.
93 Y. Bandazhevsky was in prison from 13th July to 27th December 1999. He was under house arrest until his trial on 19th February 2001.
Is it possible that the “wise men” from the West knew before the trial had even taken place, what accusations would be made against these researchers with too much scientific data at their disposal? One example. Lengfelder, at the canteen during a medical congress, revealed that Professor Okeanov had been guilty of misuse of funds. This accusation, made at the dinner table, came as a surprise to Professor Fernex94. Okeanov lost his post as director of his own institute after an epidemic of cancers among the liquidators and the inhabitants of contaminated areas in the south of Belarus95. These “experts” from the West like to pass themselves off as anti-nuclear in their own countries. They play a dual role: providing financial manna for the institutions for whom they work and conducting a kind of scientific tourism in which they glean data collected by others. It is a great publishing opportunity. Their career is assured. Many a scientist has been tempted in this way.
94 M. Fernex was no less surprised to learn that Professor Lengfelder had told various colleagues that Dr Fernex was either addicted to drugs or to alcohol. Professor Lengfelder’s vocation is quite clearly as a slanderer.
95 Cf. “La catastrophe de Tchernobyl et la santé” (The Chernobyl disaster and health), by Michel Fernex
At the end of his letter, Professor Lengfelder arrogantly dictates his terms to IPPNW. “In my view, IPPNW’s involvement in this affair, and in the campaign to gather signatures, is of such importance that I demand a formal binding declaration from the office (volle Haftung—full liability) as I propose here (contradicting the one that was foreseen):
—IPPNW will take no action, and make no comment about the proposal for a petition, without previous agreement from Professor Lengfelder.[…]” It would be funny if it were not so contemptible.
In autumn 2000, a German journalist, Alexandra Cavelius, wanted to undertake an objective investigation into the two “heretical” scientists in Belarus, using interviews with people, including Lengfelder96. She put questions to Bandazhevsky and to Nesterenko, using me as an intermediary. Here is Nesterenko’s response which he asked me to pass on to her.
96 Article published on 26th April 2001 in Sud-Deutschen Zeitung Magazin entitled “Tod dem Teddybar”.
Yakov Kenigsberg is deputy director of the Institute of Radiological Medicine at the Ministry of Health. I have no dealings with him. His position as regards the radioprotection of children in Belarus and the use of pectin is as inhuman as that of Lengfelder. On 12th May 2000, during a meeting with the Ministry of Emergency Situations, Kenigsberg argued strongly against the use of HRS measurements of children and against using the food additive pectin to protect them. He claimed that he was supported in this view by E.Lengfelder of Germany. All these people belong to the nuclear lobby and cannot be trusted with the protection of our children’s health. It is surprising: what objective view of Bandazhevsky, Nesterenko or of our work could the journalist expect from these people?
As regards the mortality figures in 1985 and today in the Gomel region, Y. Bandazhevsky could supply these. As a doctor, he has the official annual statistics of Belarus.
On 1st October 2000, the German journalist sent me a letter in Russian addressed to Bandazhevsky, that I sent on to him in a fax.
I hope I am not putting you to any trouble but I need to take into account the views of critics from the West in my inve
stigation (Mr Lengfelder and his friends). I am aware that some of their information is not accurate. It is therefore very important to do everything possible in order to refute it. In order to do this, I need more information.
1. There is this allegation: “Mr Bandazhevsky has got where he is today only because of his wife’s good relationship with various politicians. His brilliant career, at this young age, owes more to these political connections than to his academic achievements”. What can you say about this? Were you, at the time, a Party member (this has no importance to me)?
2. There is another allegation: “Bandazhevsky uses partially erroneous indices in measuring the parameters of radioactivity. He has been criticised for this by scientists in his own country”. A second criticism: “His statistical results are false. Poor mathematical work. In this connection, could you tell me the name and the address of your French assistant? Are there other witnesses who are familiar with your original work who could give me a brief assessment? Could you give me their names and addresses (a fax number would be best)? Perhaps there are even some Japanese or American people (in connection with the award “Sun. The Golden Emblem” 97).
97 International prize awarded by the United States for scientific work in the area of radiopathology.
3. Is it true that many of your colleagues have been dismissed as a result of the accusations made against you? If yes, how many are there? Is the person who retracted the false statement the vice-rector? Is this the case?
Y. Bandazhevsky replied on 2nd October 2000.
1. My wife, Galina Sergueievna Bandazhevskaya knew no politicians or government employees at the time that my career was taking off. Her parents were peasants who spent their entire lives in the same village. If you have any written information about relationships she had with politicians at that time, I would be very grateful if you would send it to me so that we can lodge a complaint…
Up until 1991, I undertook scientific research and achieved good results at the Institute of Medicine at Grodno, and there are several specialists at the central scientific research laboratory who know my work very well. During those years, 6 scientific doctorates were prepared under my direction and our team of scientists was awarded the Lenin/Komsomol prize from Belarus, for our work in experimental pathology. My scientific work was published widely in all the major journals in the USSR and is protected by copyright. My area of research was completely new at the time and had not really been studied: almost no-one in the USSR and even fewer in our Republic of Belarus had done research in this area of teratology and of experimental pathology.
In 1990, I was appointed rector of a further education centre in Gomel that did not yet exist, that I had to set up entirely on my own. I had no dealings with anyone else and I relied only and still rely only on my own scientific knowledge and expertise. This claim is borne out by the fact that when I found myself without any professional help at all, I carried out a complex technical experiment—the study of the effects of radioactive caesium on the development of the foetus—in circumstances that were utterly inadequate for such research. Over the last nine months, I have written three books and a series of articles and presentations98.
98 It was during the nine months of house arrest while awaiting trial that he undertook this work. He did not prepare himself for the trial because he was so sure that no case would be found against him.
I became a member of the Soviet Communist Party in 1988 and I left in 1991.
2. In my research, I do not use any parameters based on complicated calculations of radioactivity, in other words I do not calculate the radioactive dose received by people. I rely solely on the quantity of accumulated radionuclides in the body, measured in becquerels.
Where statistical data is used, it is strictly defined according to criteria that have been reliably established in particular according to Student’s t-distribution.
The Scientific Councils of the Institute of Stomatology in Moscow, the University, Amitie des Peuples, the University of Medicine in Moscow, the corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences in Russia, Alexei Yablokov and his colleagues, Professor Fernex and his colleagues, are all familiar with my scientific work.
I should point out that most of the scientific information obtained by myself and my colleagues has been presented in the form of doctoral theses that have been defended in various scientific institutes in Russia and in the Republic of Belarus, since most of them include a morphological section and their specimens strongly support our conclusions.
3. In my role as rector, I directed the institute and had to take responsibility for disciplining those who did not fulfil their obligations. Once, I had to dismiss the administrative vice-rector, who had seriously contravened his professional duties. He appealed to be returned to his post, but the tribunal did not find in his favour.
I am surprised that Professor Lengfelder has said these things. A week before my arrest, he visited me in my office and said very complimentary things about my research (he even gave me a film on the role of American scientists in the liquidation of the consequences of Chernobyl).
It is very odd that, after participating, as many scientists from our own country have done, in numerous seminars and symposiums held at our institute, he never contested the scientific information that I presented.
What is more, in 1998, during a meeting at the Academy of Sciences on medico-biological problems, the scientific material that I had presented was approved and a proposal was made to develop this line of research. Similar support was expressed by the eminent scientist John.W. Gofman, who is familiar with my work.
On his return from a conference in Germany, where he had learnt of the campaign being waged against the two Belarusian scientists, Professor Fernex expressed this hope:
The Republic of Belarus will eventually see where its interests lie, in spite of the advice being given from those who arrive from abroad with expensive equipment, or even with money and medicines. This country has its own researchers, and highly qualified doctors. They deserve to be listened to, and helped in the country that they serve so fervently. They also deserve worldwide recognition. Western universities should introduce them at conferences and symposiums : invite them to speak rather than speak for them as happens today; they should be helped to publish their work in the most prestigious scientific journals, even if this entails paying a scientific editor, as American academics do.
From the point of view of medical ethics, it is not acceptable to measure high levels of caesium-137 in food, and therefore a high level within children’s bodies, without providing them with a pectin cure (given that these children are not likely to be evacuated permanently). It would be like discovering the Koch bacillus in a child’s mucus and not treating the tuberculosis.99
99 M.Fernex, “Pourquoi la pectine de pomme?” (Why apple pectin?), extract from a document sent to the Swiss and French embassies on 30th June and 1st July 2004.
Part Four
THE DEMOCRATIC GAOLERS
OF THE GULAG
Chapter I
EUROPE’S DUPLICITY
Why was Professor Nesterenko never able to get any financial support from Europe to protect the health of children contaminated by the nuclear industry in Belarus?
The idea for the TEST project “Evaluation of the effectiveness of the food additive Vitapect in the elimination of radionuclides from children’s bodies” was born following a proposal made by European deputy Yves Piétrasanta in October 2000, when Nesterenko found himself in Strasbourg, having been invited by Green MEPs to the European parliament.
Piétrasanta wrote to Barry McSweeney, Director-General of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (JRC) at Ispra (Italy). McSweeney, who was familiar with the properties of pectin as an adsorbent of heavy metals, was keen to look at its effects on caesium-137. A working group met at Ispra in June 2001, with Nesterenko, Michel Fernex—who ha
d proposed the idea of a prevention campaign with Vitapect in twelve villages in the contaminated territories—and myself. Once the proposal was accepted, Michel Fernex took charge of designing the protocol for the double blind experiment.
We hoped, naively, that the funds would arrive by September 2001, knowing that Belrad would begin to experience financial problems around that time. But the Vitapect sample analysis and the writing up of JRC’s Technical Assessment were only completed in January 2002.
On 22nd February 2002, Mr Sarigiannis, scientific assistant to the Director-General of JRC, sent us his conclusions and approval with the hope “[…] that our analysis will help to develop a project that will be even more useful to the children of Belarus”.
I asked Nesterenko for his comments on the JRC report. He agreed to all the suggestions and modifications put forward by the Ispra experts, adding only a comment on the section in which JRC cites as an example, the work of the French group ETHOS in one of the villages where Belrad’s teams were working.
JRC—“The project ETHOS, undertaken in the village of Olmany near Stolin, in the Brest region, is a good example showing how the education of local people about ways to reduce individual risk can be effective in lowering the dose and achieving a certain degree of individual risk control”.
Nesterenko’s comments.
“We have the following observations to make on the ETHOS Project (and other similar projects)
Too little attention is given in the ETHOS Project to working with the local population to teach them to make practical use of the various radioprotection methods.
The Crime of Chernobyl- The Nuclear Gulag Page 35
