Documentary on Depleted Uranium Playing in Queens

A new documentary put out by the People’s Video Network, “Poison Dust,” accuses the defense department of a similar crime with respect to depleted uranium exposure—willful ignorance.
The movie will screen in Sunnyside at All Saint’s Church at 43-12 46th Street on Tuesday, April 19th at 7 p.m. After the screening, the film’s editor, Sue Harris and Raymond Ramos, a veteran from Springfield Gardens interviewed in the film, will speak and take questions.
“We’ve known about the cancer-producing and death-producing qualities of depleted uranium since the 1850s,” Harris said. She accuses the United States government of hiding the facts related to the harmfulness of this substance because the weapons it produces are so effective. “It’s just not cost-effective to be open about this.”
Is depleted uranium the Agent Orange of this generation of soldiers? “Poison Dust” seems to think so. Uranium is an extremely heavy metal, making it ideal for munitions casings as it can pierce very heavy armor. It is also radioactive.
When a uranium shell punches through another metal, like a tank, the casing vaporizes into dust. It is this dust that critics say is harming soldiers, their families and exposed civilians. Soldiers interviewed in the film report being covered in dust from morning until night, even shaking it out of their beds in the morning.
They complain of symptoms from headaches to swelling to chronic fatigue. One Bronx soldier’s daughter, conceived shortly after his return, has a severely deformed hand from a birth defect. He was convinced of the involvement of depleted uranium when he saw photographs of similar deformities in Iraqi children.