Hysteria prevails in many countries under the fear of a nuclear war. It is not only pharmacists in Bulgaria who in the last six days have sold off everything they had in iodine preparations, which is also happening in Poland, while there is an increased demand for these preparations in Belgium, France and the Netherlands. Indeed, in the last 24 hours there has been a shortage of these preparations in Greek pharmacies, as confirmed to protothema.gr, pharmacists with whom we contacted.
Since last week there has been a shortage of preparations of all companies containing iodine as a dietary supplement," says protothema.gr pharmacist Dimitris Psarros. "These preparations have become popular because consumers believe that by taking them they will face possible side effects that may be caused by the release of radioactivity into the atmosphere from a possible accident at the Ukrainian nuclear power plant or in fear of a nuclear disaster," he adds.
The price of iodine preparations is not prohibitive, specifically they range from 15 to 25 euros and perhaps this is an additional reason why they have already "gone" from the shelves of many pharmacies in the country.
A pharmacist from the region of New Eritrea tells protothema.gr that all iodine preparations have been sold out and that the demand is quite high.
Professor of Pharmacology, Pharmacogenomics and Precision Medicine and Director of the Pharmacology Laboratory of the Medical Department of the Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH) Evangelos Manolopoulos explained how iodine pills can help in case of detection of radioactivity in the atmosphere from a nuclear accident or any nuclear explosion.
"In cases where a nuclear accident or any nuclear explosion occurs, one of the very radioactive and harmful to the body ions created is iodine 131. Iodine has a characteristic of concentrating in the thyroid and causing thyroid cancer. About 30% of the radiation we get goes to the thyroid gland through iodine. So if you take iodine medicine very quickly right after the accident, that iodine that we take goes and binds to the thyroid and interferes with the binding of the radioactive element, so it greatly reduces the chances of thyroid cancer. It's a dietary supplement, it's not prescription and those who are afraid of nuclear war go out and buy it. So stocks are running out."
Source: Proto Thema
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