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A comment on Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed cancer risk, kept quiet.

Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by joker_minmax on Saturday July 29, 2023 @07:05PM (#36925744)
Tobacco also loves to collect uranium and thorium in the root. As much as I want to blame the company here, they're already selling poison. What percentage of it is their fault if the poison is even more poisonous?
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by replwoacause on Saturday July 29, 2023 @08:05PM (#36926213)
100% of it
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by pfdietz on Sunday July 30, 2023 @06:49AM (#36929842)
Collecting uranium in plant tissues won't do much to increase Po-210, since the decay chain to Po-210 runs through Ra-226, which has a halflife of 1600 years.
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by joker_minmax on Sunday July 30, 2023 @10:13AM (#36931310)
The polonium is not the only thing decaying in the tobacco, is all I meant.
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by pfdietz on Sunday July 30, 2023 @11:02AM (#36931836)
If you eat uranium, the radioactivity is so low level that the chemical toxicity is more important.
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by joker_minmax on Sunday July 30, 2023 @12:20PM (#36932818)
Not eating, though, inhalation of particulates into the lungs.
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Re:Big Tobacco knew radioactive Po210 in cigarettes posed ca... by pfdietz on Monday July 31, 2023 @10:55AM (#36943522)
I don't think the route of ingestion would alter the point I made.
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