Safety and security of the CS-137 needles in disuse in Paraguay

The great majority of the accidents serious they are due to the loss or robbery radioactive sources. A radioactive source sealed in disuse is an accident in power if it is not stored under security's conditions, and it is conditioned properly or it is undergoes an adapted final disposition. Often these sources in disuse are forgotten and they are not object the appropriate heretic's loss test, that which could give place to their it lost or robbery Because Paraguay doesn't have a National System of the Radioactive Waste management, for disposition of the Regulatory Authority, the users kept in their own facilities their radioactive sources sealed in disuse without management, and distributed in different places, but under the CNEA Regulatory Control. The provisional storage is accepted by the Regulatory Authority if the Installation gathers the security conditions to avoid the loss or robbery Nevertheless, the Physical Security gives in the Interim Storage maybe it is not viable in a hospital or another type of medical installation, it given the possibility that kind of source could be stolen. As it is possible that a source gives this type it is stolen, the Regulatory Authority has adopted safety precaution efficacies to guarantee the source physical security, like it is the specific case of the National Institute the Cancer that has the following sources in disuse: 1. A header cobalt 60 (stored in its own Bunker) 2. 108 needles Cesium 137 (stored in an deposit inside the property) 3. 268 mg of Radio 226 (Conditioned under a project with the OIEA) Due these sources are in different deposits inside the hospital, and for a better control and security of them, the CNEA dispose to transfer the sources Cs-137 (108 needles distributed in 10 lead containers) inside the Bunker, where is stored the Co-60 Teletherapy source. This procedure was realized because these sources were stored in an precarious deposit and without the corresponding system physical security, avoiding of that way that the same one falls in chatarreros hands, since each container of lead weighs 15 Kg approximately and having in it counts the frequent cases of sources that have finished as scraps due to an inadequate management. Nevertheless the security is not the only concern that raise from the radioactive source. Given the recent increase of the worry for the terrorist activity, it cannot pass for high the possibility that a terrorist group uses a source to manufacture a device to radioactive material dispersion. (author)