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Putin's nuclear threat is prompting Europeans to panic-buy iodine as they think it may protect them from radiation, reports say
Putin
Russian President Vladimir Putin.Kremlin Press Office/Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
  • Putin ordered Russia to put its nuclear weapons on high alert.

  • Reports say Europeans are buying it because they think it could protect them from radiation.

  • In a nuclear war, officials said that iodine wouldn't help.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has a nuclear threat and Europeans are afraid of being exposed to radiation, multiple reports say.

Since Putin ordered Russia's nuclear weapons to be placed on high alert, some pharmacies in the Czech Republic, Poland, and Bulgaria have sold out of iodine.

Iodine pills
Iodine pills seen in a classroom in Fessenheim, France, on June 12, 2018, during a nuclear accident drill.Reuters

According to the chair of the Pharmacies Union, Bulgaria's pharmacies have sold as much iodine in the past six days as they usually do each year.

In Poland, the number of pharmacies that sell iodine more than doubled.

Despite being far away from the conflict in Ukraine, officials in other European countries are seeing an increase in demand.

In Belgium, over 30,000 people picked up free iodine tablets in the pharmacy. Le Parisien reported that the pharmacy union in France reported a significant increase in people requesting the medication.

Iodine can be taken in pill or syrup form and can be used to help protect people from developing cancer caused by radiation.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that taking iodine is not protective if there is no radiation in the body.

European officials said this week that taking the medication wouldn't help in the case of a nuclear war.

The Federal Agency for Nuclear Control said that the current situation in Ukraine does not require taking tablets of iodine.

The head of the Czech State Office for Nuclear Safety, Dana Drabova, said that radiation protection when nuclear weapons are used is useless.

The original article is on Business Insider.

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