Forearmed is forewarned

IN AN apparent move at safeguarding its citizens, the French government began handing out iodine pills to some 400,000 people living near nuclear plants in the last week of April. The act was more significant in the wake of the 10th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster on April 26. Reasoned Jean Blanc, who is in charge of accident response in the government's off ice for protection against radiation, "in Chernobyl, they were distributing iodine pills two days after the explosion, much too late". Iodine is the only known substance which can offer some amount of protection against deadly radiation.

While the government move is being considered ominous in some circles (a woman staying near a nuclear plant in Nogent-sur-Seine, about 100 km southeast of Paris, remarked, "it is very upsetting"), French officials say that if at all an accident on the scale of Chernobyl should occur, they would like citizens to be prepared. The iodine pills produced by the French Army's central pharmacy, contains 100 mg of iodine 131 and should be consumed within an hour of a nuclear accident.