A former KGB spy turned British citizen and vocal critic of the Russian government. His last statement accused the Putin government of murdering him. The poison was a highly radioactive element: polonium-210 Russia has repeatedly refused to extradite the main suspects despite Britain's official requests.
Litvinenko autopsy will require extra precautions
By Dan Vergano USA TODAY
Just like everything else in the mysterious death of former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, even his autopsy will be unusual.
Polonium, the deadly radioactive element tied to Litvinenko's Nov. 23 death, complicates the process.
“Generally, it's not recommended that you autopsy radiation poisoning victims,” says health physicist Andrew Karam of MJW Corp. in Buffalo, an author of National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurement guidelines on contaminated bodies. “You have to treat bodily fluids as potentially radioactive contaminants.”
New Scientist magazine claims that pathologists will take special measures, including wearing full-body respirator suits, during the autopsy. “In a criminal investigation, (investigators) will be even more painstaking than usual, taking more samples and documentation,” says health physicist Kelly Classic of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
Science writer John Emsley has calculated that, by weight, polonium is about a trillion times more toxic than cyanide. Eating or breathing less than one-thousandth of a gram typically causes death in 20 days, according to the Health Physics Society.
Polonium was discovered in 1898 by physicists Marie and Pierre Curie and named after Marie's native land of Poland. Her daughter, scientist Irène Joliot-Curie, died in 1956 of leukemia attributed to an explosion years earlier of a polonium capsule in her laboratory.
Just like uranium, radon and radium, polonium emits radioactive “alpha particles.” Alpha particles are the “offensive lineman” of radioactive particles, Classic says, big and slow. “You don't want one to hit you, but they are not going very far.” One-thousandth of a gram of polonium emits the same number of alpha particles as 5 grams of radium.
But polonium emits “wimpy” alpha particles, Karam says, easily blocked by skin or even a few inches of air. (For this reason, a sealed container's walls would screen the stuff from radiation detectors.) And that means it must be swallowed or inhaled to kill someone, its alpha emissions destroying tissues as it travels through the bloodstream.
Litvinenko, 43, died in the classic pattern of polonium poisoning: food poisoning symptoms followed by hair loss and a steep decline in white blood cells. The isotope in this case is polonium-210, which has a number of industrial uses and is one of the most deadly forms.
Health physicists view eating polonium as the most deadly route, Karam says. Slowly traveling through the intestine, its radioactivity would kill sensitive cells, spurring food poisoning symptoms. Polonium would then accumulate in the kidney and spleen over the next few days, causing weakness.
Finally, its arrival in the bone marrow would kill white blood cells. “Fairly nasty stuff,” Karam says.
Investigators retracing the steps of Litvinenko and those who had contact with him have found traces of a radioactive substance in at least two British Airways jets. If that substance is polonium, its weak alpha emitters mean travelers face little risk, Karam says, “unless passengers were licking seats.” Pregnant passengers faced no extra risks, he adds.
In theory, the polonium recovered from Litvinenko could offer clues to its origin, Classic says, either from a nuclear reactor or widely used industrial devices. “I doubt it will pinpoint one person though,” she says.
“I am chagrined by one thing about the case,” Karam says. A few years ago, he was approached by producers of the CSI television series to comment on a polonium-poisoning scenario. He told them it was too far-fetched.
“Now, it is all health physicists can talk about,” he says.
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition...side01.art.htm
Timeline of the case: http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pag...uk/6179074.stm
Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Litvinenko
Info on polonium-210 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6181688.stm