More or less. According to Ritter DU is quite a bit different from contamination in the form of radiation caused by Atom-bombs and/or explosions of atomic reactors. He talks about DU as working/behaving more as a poison that gets dangerous as soon as you digest or inhale it. For example, if you would walk into a store room full of unused DU Munition, the radiation itself wouldn’t really be harmful. Or if you would walk over an area in which the soil is „decontaminated“ with DU dust, the radiation itself isn’t dangerous. When it enters the body, then it gets dangerous.
I dunno how true that is though.
That is about right, here are some excerpts from one Material Safety Data Sheet about uranium from Canada has:
Conditions to Avoid: Do not create dusty work conditions.
Hazardous Decomposition Products: Uranium metal fume and/or oxide can be produced during uranium fires. Radioactive progeny (daughters) thorium-234,protactinium-234, and protactinium-234m (metastable) are produced by natural radioactive decay and are the source of the majority of the penetrating radiation. These isotopes can be concentrated in situations where the metal is melted, condensed, or dissolved, potentially elevating the observed external dose rate.
Stability/Polymerization: Material is stable in closed containers at room temperature under normal storage and handling conditions. Hazardous polymerization cannot occur. In the presence of moisture or humidity, uranium metal may react to evolve flammable hydrogen gas. For depleted uranium oxide ,this hazard is greatly diminished or eliminated.
SECTION VI. HEALTH HAZARD INFORMATION
Summary of Risk: Uranium and its salts are both toxic and radioactive. Dermatitis,renal damage, acute necrotic arterial lesions, and possibly death may occur from extreme exposure. Inhalation of fine uranium particles presents increased radiation hazards; isolated uranium particles in the lungs may be a long-term cancer hazard. The more soluble uranium compounds are considered most toxic to the kidneys; the lung is the critical organ for insoluble respirable dusts or fines such as oxide powders. Uranium dusts are respiratory irritants, with coughing or shortness of breath as possible outcomes. Prolonged skin contact can cause damage to the basal cells. Radioactivity is the property of the spontaneous emissions of alpha or beta particles and gamma rays, by the disintegration of the nuclei of the atoms.
See also: the publication from Disarmament Forum on
Uranium Weapons which analysed the problems caused by DU in Iraq. They write:
Depleted uranium (DU), the main by-product of uranium enrichment, is a chemically and radiologically toxic heavy metal. It is mildly radioactive, with about 60% of the activity of natural uranium.
Next other details from an article from the EU, published in 2010
Opinion on the Environmental and Health Risks Posed by Depleted Uranium
Natural uranium. Uranium is among the 20 most abundant elements on earth and ispresent in a variety of minerals. Its relative abundance is similar to that of silver or gold and U is more abundant than tin, mercury and lead.
For comparison, I tried to find out how much uranium there is in a ton of rock. This
article from Sweden says that there are typically 2-3 grams per ton, but with large variations, but using those values if we have 1000 tons of rock it will give 2-3 kg of Uranium. With 2000 tons you have enough to make a 120 mm artillery round, with a 4.5 kg rod, but it would be more radioactive than a normal round, because the uranium is in natural form and not depleted of U235. For more on the content of uranium in rocks, see this
article from the UK, which gives more and actually higher values. And this
article from the US gives a value that corresponds to 4 grams per ton.
The EU paper mentioned that the amount of Uranium in some parts of the world is naturally high, even in water:
Due to its widespread presence, natural U occurs also in human food and drinking water.In groundwater and in private wells used for drinking water abstraction, concentrationsof U are highly variable, ranging from <0.1 up to 40 µg/L (UNSCEAR, 1993). Extremely high values (up to 12,400 µg/L) have been measured in groundwater in Finland and in other Nordic countries, linked to high concentrations of U in geologic formations (Karpaset al., 2005; Kurttio et al., 2005; NCRP, 1999).The average daily intake of natural U in humans is estimated as 1 to 2 µg from food and1.5 µg from drinking water (ATSDR, 1999; UBA, 2005; UNEP, 2001); ingestion with foodrepresents the major source in areas with low concentrations of U in drinking water(Fisenne et al., 1987; Priest, 2001).
The Depleted Uranium in artillery rounds, when used, will change to fragments of metal or oxides due to burning. Even if they are initially fragments, they will begin to oxidize, just like iron when it rusts.
The EU paper has this image showing the size of the particles of DU when the rounds are used:
Particles below 1 micrometer are called
aerosols. Since the rounds in Kiev were exploded, we do not know how that influenced the size of the particles, but since an increase in radiation was measured, parts of them must have burned or were broken up into dust sized particles.
The next study found different kinds of uranium oxides when the dust left by exploded round:
Oxidation states of uranium in depleted uranium particles from Kuwait by B. Salbu a, K. Janssens b, O.C. Lind a, K. Proost b, L. Gijsels b, P.R. Danesi c
Redirecting
Compared to well-defined standards, all investigated DU particles were oxidized.
Uranium particles collected from swipes were characterized as UO2, U3O8 or a mixture of these oxidized forms, similar to that observed in DU affected areas in Kosovo. Uranium particles formed during fire in the DU ammunition facility were, however, present as oxidation state +5 and +6, with
XANES spectra similar to solid uranyl standards.
Environmental or health impact assessments for areas affected by DU munitions should therefore take into account the presence of respiratory UO2, U3O8 and even UO3 particles, their corresponding
weathering rates and the subsequent mobilisation of U from oxidized DU particles.
From the WHO, 2002, there was:
Depleted uranium: an overview of its properties and health effects (
pdf) It has a table of the decay products from U238 among much else, but it is from 2002.
Most depleted uranium particles that come into the body are excreted, and only little remains. If a lot of dust comes around, one could boost detox procedures, as for any other heavy metal, what else to do? Wondering how people responded in Ukraine, I have checked Telegram Channels for Khmelnytskyi - life goes on, several channels are about finding jobs.
www.dailymail.co.uk
An 
️The Armed Forces of Ukraine transferred thousands of military personnel to the Odessa region to prepare a provocation against Pridnestrovie, a RT source said.
(Alina Lipp)
