She wrote the book "No Immediate Danger", describing the dangers of radiation from the nuclear industry. [3] Rosalie won many awards, including the Right Livelihood Award in 1986, for "raising public awareness about the destruction of the biosphere and human gene pool, especially by low-level radiation." She died of cancer in 2012.
Biography
Rosalie Bertell was born to Paul G. and Helen (née Twohey) Bertell in Buffalo, New York, the third of four children. Her mother was Canadian and her father was American. She had an older sister, Mary Katherine Bertell (1925–2011), and a younger brother, John Twohey Bertell (1930–2002). A third sibling, Paul W. Bertell died in infancy in 1921. In 1966, she received a Ph.D in Biometrics from the Catholic University of America.[citation needed] She received her BA in Math/Physics/Education from D'Youville College, and later was an associate professor of mathematics at D'Youville from 1969–1973.[4]
Bertell was a coordinator for the International Medical Commission on Bhopal, and campaigned for an independent body "to coordinate health care, research and rehabilitation" for victims of the Bhopal disaster.[5] Bertell's Nuclear Contamination Act was adopted April 2006, as World Legislative Act 35 by the 9th session of the Provisional World Parliament.[6] She suffered attempts on her life, and attacks on her scientific credentials.[7]
There is a Rosalie Bertell fond at Library and Archives Canada.[10] The archival reference number is R6847, former archival reference number MG31-K39.[11] The fond covers the date range 1942 to 2001. It contains textual records, audio-visual material and graphic material.
