Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake

Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake , née Feuerhake (born September 28, 1935 in Osnabrück ) is a physicist and mathematician and became known in Germany through research on the Elbmarsch leukemia cluster .

Live and act

Inge Feuerhake studied physics and mathematics in Hanover and Würzburg and then worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Applied Physics at the Technical University of Hanover . In 1966, she was with a thesis on dosimetry of the radioactive fallout Dr. rer. nat. PhD .

From 1966 to 1973 she was a physicist at the Institute for Nuclear Medicine at the Hannover Medical School , where she did research in the field of dosimetry and the diagnostic use of radioactive emitters . During this time she met the industrial physicist Klaus Schmitz, whom she married in 1969.

In 1973 Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake was appointed professor for experimental physics at the University of Bremen . She conducted research in the fields of dosimetry, radiation protection and the health effects of radioactive sources. She held the professorship until her retirement in 2000.

Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake had a decisive influence on the attempt to clear up the increasingly observed cases of leukemia (excess) in the vicinity of nuclear power plants. She was a leader in the leukemia commissions set up by the state governments in Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony.

The extensive research and technical discussions of these two bodies remained inconclusive, however. Until today (March 2019) it has not been possible to provide causal evidence that the radioactive substances from the four nuclear power plants on the Elbe are the cause of the increase in the likelihood of children suffering from leukemia as the distance between the home and the nuclear power plant decreases.

Already at the time when Schmitz-Feuerhake still held the professorship at the University of Bremen, widely recognized method of determining the frequency of the "dicentric chromosomes" from the blood of living people with the help of "biological dosimetry" allows a quantitative assessment of the The subject was exposed to radiation in the past. (Explanation: In the blood of the unirradiated person there are almost only monocentric chromosomes, which means that they have only 1 center.

The responsible ministries - previously ministries of social affairs, today mostly ministries of the environment - have not carried out or commissioned any studies with a statistically sufficient number of residents in the vicinity of the nuclear power plants until today (March 2019).

Since the 1980s she has been working intensively on leukemia accumulations in Germany.

Schmitz-Feuerhake became known nationwide when she examined the accumulation of leukemia in children in the vicinity of the Krümmel nuclear power plant . In 1990 Schmitz-Feuerhake became a founding member of the Society for Radiation Protection. V. and co-editor of the reports of the Otto Hug Strahlinstitut e. V. Again and again she wrote studies that were supposed to prove that the leukemia cluster Elbmarsch is supposed to be radioactively contaminated by the nuclear power plant Krümmel.

In 1992 she became a member of the Schleswig-Holstein Leukemia Commission, which was dissolved in 2004 when six of the eight members had demonstratively resigned, with allegations of a "policy of covering up" the authorities. Shortly after the founding of the commission, however, it was complained that the majority of the members would polarize, insisted on an incident at the Krümmel plant from the outset and withhold contradicting studies.

In 1998 Schmitz-Feuerhake examined dust in attics in Elbmarsch and allegedly found plutonium in proportions that could not be explained either by the Chernobyl disaster or by nuclear weapon tests in the 1960s. According to her statement, she was able to prove that the plutonium and the fission products clearly came from the Krümmel nuclear reactor. However, other experts could not understand this conclusion in their analyzes and attributed these traces to the aboveground nuclear weapons tests.

In 2003 she was elected Chair of the European Committee on Radiation Risk ECRR, an anti-nuclear scientific critic group. Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake is also a member of the board of trustees of the German Environmental Foundation .

In 2003 Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake received the Nuclear-Free Future Award for her life's work.

criticism

Schmitz-Feuerhake has become known to a broader public, especially through controversial contributions about the Elbmarsch leukemia cluster. Many of their results are questioned by other experts. Critics accuse her of being biased due to her clear anti-nuclear stance and criticize the fact that the results of her investigations on the subject of nuclear energy are already fixed in advance. Elsewhere there is talk of a public internal dispute between colleagues.

Publications

• Authors group of the project SAIU at the University of Bremen: To the correct understanding of the nuclear industry - 66 replies . Oberbaumverlag, Berlin 1975.
• I. Schmitz-Feuerhake, B. Dannheim, A. Heimers, B. Oberheitmann, H. Schröder, H. Ziggel: Leukaemia in the proximity of a German boiling water reactor: evidence of population exposure by chromosome studies and environmental radioactivity . In: Environ. Health Perspect. , 105, Suppl. 6, 1997, pp. 1499-1504, PMID 9467072
• W. Hoffmann, I. Schmitz-Feuerhake: How radiation-specific is the dicentric assay? In: J. Exposure Analysis Environmental Epidemiology 2/1999, pp. 113-133
• I. Bruske-Hohlfeld, H. Scherb, M. Bauchinger, E. Schmid, H. Fender, G. Wolf, G. Obe, I. Schmitz-Feuerhake, H. Schröder, G. Stephan, M. Csicsaky, HE Wichmann : A cluster of childhood leukaemias near two neighboring nuclear installations in Northern Germany: prevalence of chromosomal aberrations in peripheral blood lymphocytes . In: Int. J. Radiat. Biol. , 77 (1), 2001, pp. 111-116, PMID 11213343
• I. Schmitz-Feuerhake, H. von Boetticher, B. Dannheim, K. Gotz, A. Heimers, W. Hoffmann, H. Schröder: Estimation of x ray overexposure in a childhood leukaemia cluster by means of chromosome aberration analysis In: Radiat . Prot. Dosimetry , 98 (3), 2002, pp. 291-297 PMID 12018746
• I. Schmitz-Feuerhake, JW Mietelski, P. Gaca: Transuranic isotopes and 90Sr in attic dust in the vicinity of two nuclear establishments in northern Germany . In: Health Physics , 84, 2003, pp. 599-607, PMID 12747479
• DB Richardson, S. Wing, J. Schroeder, I. Schmitz-Feuerhake, W. Hoffmann: Ionizing radiation and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. In: Environ Health Perspect. , 2005 Jan; 113 (1), pp. 1-5, PMID 15626639
• W. Mämpel, S. Pflugbeil, R. Schmitz, I. Schmitz-Feuerhake: Underestimated health risks from radioactivity using the example of radar soldiers. (= Reports from the Otto Hug Radiation Institute, report no.25), Berlin 2015, ISSN 0941-0791

Web links

• The disaster of the nuclear critics (panorama of December 10, 1998)
• Otto Hug Radiation Institute
• ECRR homepage

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Children with cancer at the Krümmel nuclear power plant - The disaster of the nuclear critics , Panorama report from December 10, 1998.
2. ↑ Eckhard Stengel: Reactor emissions in the professor's attic? ( Memento of the original from February 23, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Copy of an article by the freelance journalist from the Stuttgarter Zeitung .