Guarapari: Brazil's Radioactive Beaches - Unusual Places
Workers processing monazite sand. Photo: bionerd23/Flickr. In the 1970s, physician Silva Mello falsely stated that the radioactive sands of Guarapari had curative properties. Mellow wrote a book that claimed a combination of radioactive sand and the sun's UV rays could cure a variety of ailments including arthritis and cancer. Visitors ...