From the floor of the British House (Feb 7, 2001):

10 pm Mr. Alasdair Morgan (Galloway and Upper Nithsdale): ...It relates mainly to the test firing of depleted uranium shells from the Ministry of Defence base at Dundrennan, which lies on the Solway estuary in Kirkcudbrightshire in my constituency and which is now run by the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency.

My first foray into that area was in April 1998, when I asked a question about the firing of such shells at the range. The answer from Sir John Chisholm, chief executive of DERA, was that 6,255 shells had been fired at Dundrennan since 1982 and that four had been recovered--not 4,000 or 400, but four. To bring these figures up to date, 6,907 shells have now been fired at Dundrennan. Following national press stories, which sought to link depleted uranium to Gulf war syndrome, I wrote to Lord Robertson, who was then Secretary of State for Defence, on l December 1998, asking for action to be taken to recover the shells. I received a reply from the then Minister for the Armed Forces, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, North (Mr. Henderson), stating that DERA "does not currently have a programme in place to recover DU projectiles from the Solway Firth, nor does it intend to initiate such a programme."

I am interested in how many depleted uranium shells the MOD needs. In the Gulf war, 100 rounds were used against the Iraqis and some rounds were used during training in Saudi Arabia. Regardless of the argument about whether or not depleted uranium should be used, if we are going to use only approximately 100 rounds, do we really need to test 7,000 rounds? The United Kingdom has fired 70 times as much depleted uranium at Dundrennan as it did in the Gulf war.

Hear, hear! Click the link to read the full testimony of the respectable MP.

From the "Identifying Misinformation" section of the US State Department Web site USinfo.state.gov. This info source explicitly frames accusations against DU as a "ConspSiracy Theory." This is as close to straight from the horses mouth as you'll ever get. Recommended!

You Are In: USINFO > Resource Tools > Identifying Misinformation
False Allegations Regarding Depleted Uranium Rumors of adverse health effects proved inaccurate

May 11, 2006

House Passes McDermott Depleted Uranium Study Amendment
Possible DU Health Effects on Soldiers Will Be Studied

Not officially official, but close enough.

Here is a link to Rand Corporation's extensive publications on DU.

Opinion of the Group of Experts established according to Article 31 of the European Treaty, chartered by the European Commission
report delivered 2001.03.06.

Backgrounder Documentation BG-00.0019 May 2000
DEPLETED URANIUM

An extended introduction to DU. This document comes out decidedly on the interpretation that DU armaments pose little radiological threat, even on the battlefield.

Click for selected quotes: Safe on battlefield   Safe debris   Safe to breathe

This document should provide an excellent starting point for debate.  

The health hazards of depleted uranium munitions-Part 1 (Full Report) 22 May 2001

The first of two reports that the Royal Society has published examining the health effects of depleted uranium munitions was published in May 2001. Due to the lack of experimental data, the approach taken was to estimate the typical levels of exposure on the battlefield over a wide range of scenarios, and the worst-case exposures that individuals are unlikely to exceed. These estimated values have then been used to assess the potential health risks from radiation. The report also considers epidemiological studies of occupational exposures to uranium in other situations as an independent source of information on the risks of inhaling DU particles, although it recognises that the parallels may not be precise.

Part 2 can be found here:

http://deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/pdfs/royal_society_report_du_2.pdf

Reviews of both by Dr. Ronald Kathren can be found here:

http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0952-4746/21/3/701
http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0952-4746/22/2/708

Some comments here: http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0952-4746/22/3/103

... Repetitive reports which do not add any substance to what is already known do not seem to serve any purpose. It is possible that at the time of incidents, such as deployment of DU in the Gulf and the Balkans, there were political, military or policy restraints to normal practices. As a consequence the repeated publication and media coverage of these events decades after they took place can only serve to cause a lack of confidence by the general public, a belief that a cover-up took place....
Eric I Hamilton 2002 J. Radiol. Prot. 22 309-311 (Letter to Editor)

And a response to those, here:

Eric Hamilton takes the Royal Society and myself to task for investigating the health hazards of depleted uranium munitions. In his view the matter appears to be clear. Exposures to uranium have been studied extensively for decades in the nuclear industry and there is little evidence of adverse health consequences. Exposures to DU on the battlefield are therefore unlikely to have health consequences and setting up an independent working group to look at the scientific issues only suggests there are doubts about the science, and leads to mistrust and confusion in the minds of the public. ...
Brian G Spratt 2002 J. Radiol. Prot. 22 312-313 (Letter to Editor)
(Chair of RS Working Group that produced the reports)

And this, about a Royal Society public meeting regarding the report:

MEETING REPORT The Health Hazards of Depleted Uranium London, 13 June 2001
H Jackson 2001 J. Radiol. Prot. 21 327

On Wednesday 13 June, the Royal Society hosted a public meeting to discuss the report and approximately 80 people, either as individuals or representing bodies (such as CND, Pugwash, MOD, Gulf Veterans Association and a host of academic, scientific, regulatory and commercial bodies), gathered at the British Academy. The meeting was chaired by Edward Stourton (BBC). Given that the study was fundamentally scientific in character, the composition of the discussion panel fronting the meeting must have come as a surprise to many, not least perhaps to those who comprised the working group. Along with Professor Spratt, who introduced the report, were Professor Malcolm Hooper (as Chief Scientific Adviser to the Gulf War Veterans), Dr Chris Busby (for The Low Level Radiation Campaign), and Sir Keith O'Nions (Chief Scientific Adviser, Ministry of Defence). At least the composition of this panel ensured wider-ranging discussion than the purely scientific, and attendance by the `non-Establishment'.

This meeting report, in my opinion, treats as gosphel, an assertion that no published scientific literature whatsoever supports DU harm through radiation at normal dispersal levels. I'm not so sure that is true.

U.S. General Accounting Office - GAO/NSIAD-93-90 -
Operation Desert Storm: Army Not Adequately Prepared to Deal with Depleted Uranium Contamination (January 1993) -

Press Release - 24 Apr 2003
Royal Society calls on coalition forces to reveal where DU has been used in Iraq

The Royal Society, the UK’s national science academy, today (24 April 2003) called on coalition forces to reveal where and how much depleted uranium was used in the conflict in Iraq, so that an effective clean-up and monitoring programme of both soldiers and civilians can begin. It also highlighted the need to obtain further data on the exposure levels that can occur on the battlefield and in residential areas.

POSSIBLE LONG TERM HEALTH CONSEQUENCES OF GULF WAR EXPOSURES: AN INDEPENDENT EVALUATION - United States Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs
(Alternate link)

The original PDF file is missing, but this Google cache is still available. The rest of the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs musings can be found here using Google. There ain't much. More details can be found on DUBBS here.

This report concludes that, although the military doesn't know what causes Gulf War Syndrome, it just couldn't possibly be depleted uranium, and it only takes a few sentences to explain why.

Exposure to uranium, depleted or non-depleted, is not known to produce adverse effects on the nervous system (Thun et al., 1985; Leggett, 1989; Morris and Meinhold, 1995). Reports of exposure to depleted uranium to soldiers in the Persian Gulf, although uncertain, suggest limited numbers of involved personnel. These facts make extremely unlikely that exposure to depleted uranium during the Gulf War is responsible, wholly or in part, for the array of symptoms observed among Gulf War veterans. (p.8)

This quote is from the first part of the report, HEALTH EFFECTS OF EXPOSURES TO NEUROTOXIC AGENTS USED IN THE PERSIAN GULF WAR (pp.3-14), which gives approximately equal consideration to DU and DEET. Uranium is not mentioned again in the entire 92 page report save for a category in the table, Frequency of Self-Reported Environmental Exposures in Gulf War Veterans (GWV) a and Active Duty Service Member (ADS) on p. 82.

Environmental Exposure Report
Depleted Uranium in the Gulf (II)
Under direction of: Bernard Rostker, Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses, U.S. Department of Defense
Last Update: December 13, 2000

This massive report, produced by the military, unsurprisingly concludes that DU has minimal negative consequences which do not outweigh its usefulness on the battlefield.

Quotes from Conclusions:

Meanwhile, it is important to note that to date the VA DU Medical Follow-up Program has not detected adverse clinical outcomes associated with DU's chemical or radiological toxicity in any participants. Since 1993, the Baltimore VA Medical Center has monitored 33 Level I veterans seriously injured in friendly-fire DU incidents; about half the group retains DU metal fragments in their bodies. While these veterans have definite medical problems from their wartime wounds, they do not have medical problems due to DU's chemical or radiological toxicity. Since monitoring began in 1993, the veterans retaining DU fragments consistently have had higher-than-normal amounts of uranium in their urine. The VA therefore is following them very carefully, administering a broad battery of medical tests to determine whether the depleted uranium fragments are causing any health problems. The last testing reported (1997) shows no adverse clinical outcomes from DU.

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry's and RAND Corporation's reviews of the medical and scientific literature on uranium's and DU's effects support the conclusion that the exposures Gulf War veterans experienced are unlikely to cause illnesses. The recent Institute of Medicine (IOM) study further supports these reviews by concluding that there was "limited/suggestive evidence of no association" between uranium exposure and renal dysfunction or lung cancer at cumulative exposures of less than 20 rem, an amount roughly four times the highest Gulf War estimates. The IOM report also stated there were inadequate or insufficient data to determine whether an association exists between exposure to uranium and a variety of health conditions, including bone cancer, lung cancer (at cumulative exposures greater than 20 rem), lymphatic cancer, nervous system disease, nonmalignant respiratory disease, and other various health outcomes.[193]

Taken together, the USACHPPM assessments, the medical follow-up findings, and the recent scientific reviews form an increasingly solid body of medical and scientific evidence that DU is not causing Gulf War veterans' illnesses.

Information Paper
Impact of Laboratory Performance of Urine Uranium Analyses on Exposure Evaluations for Gulf War Veterans
Under direction of: William Winkenwerder, Jr., MD, Assistant Secretary of Defense (Health Affairs) and Special Assistant to the Under Secretary of Defense (Personnel and Readiness) for Gulf War Illnesses, Medical Readiness, and Military Deployments, U.S. Department of Defense
Last Update: October 18, 2002

Quote from Summary:

Urine analysis is the most common method for evaluating uranium or depleted uranium exposures for their possible chemical or radiological effects. Reliable methods are available that measure either the total amount of uranium or the amount of individual uranium isotopes in urine. Department of Defense laboratories and laboratories under contract with the Department of Veterans Affairs have analyzed urine from Gulf War participants to evaluate exposures to depleted uranium. These laboratories have detected elevated concentrations of urinary uranium in veterans who retain depleted uranium fragments in their bodies from friendly fire incidents. Media reports have indicated that independent laboratory analyses of urine confirmed depleted uranium exposures in Gulf War veterans who did not retain fragments. Those reports have not contained enough data for scientific evaluation of the quality of the work, were inconsistent with urinary uranium values reported by the Department of Veterans Affairs and therefore raised questions about the reliability of the laboratory analyses.

Quote from Conclusions:

Today, reports of measurements of uranium in urine continue to claim evidence for confirming exposure to DU in Gulf War veterans. Those reports, based on measurements of isotopic uranium in urine with very low total uranium concentrations, cause concern among veterans and the public. At the same time, scientists view the claims with skepticism because of doubts about laboratory capabilities. This study’s performance on isotopic uranium for the 0.1 mg category provides support for those doubts. Additional studies could evaluate the performance of isotopic uranium measurements at these low concentrations and characterize the behavior of uranium isotopes in normal populations .

GulfLink
Office of the Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses

A badly-designed page aimed at those concerned about health effects of the Gulf War.
Depleted uranium links are here.