The U.S. Energy Department has waived a ban on licenses for the export of weapons-grade uranium for making medical isotopes, a move that critics said raises proliferation risks and undermines companies that are converting to safer materials.
Highly enriched uranium (HEU) is commonly used to make medical isotopes, and for this purpose large quantities are not needed. However, if enough of it were accumulated it could find its way into a bomb.
U.S. Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette has said in a letter to the top members of the U.S. House of Representatives energy committee that his department had determined that the global supplies of a substance that is used to make medical isotopes but does not involve highly enriched uranium are not sufficient to meet the needs of American patients.