| When
Flawed Comparisons on Radiation Exposure Are Made To Downplay
The Problem, What You Can Say |
| When they belittle your claims... |
by comparing any exposure from their facilities to... |
You say or ask... |
| ...about your exposure to fallout from nuke plants or
weapons testing fallout... |
....background radiation... |
'Background radiation doesn't mean it is harmless - it
probably does cause a small portion of cancers. If you are adding
to the background radiation, you are adding to someone's risk.'
'How many more defective children will be born and how
many cancers will be induced by this increase in 'background radiation'?
|
| ...about your exposure to fallout from nuke plants or
weapons testing fallout... |
...flying in a airplane... |
'That is not a realistic comparison. Radionuclides
in fallout are incorporated into our bodies (tissue, bones). Most of the radiation from cosmic rays is external.' |
| ...about your exposure to fallout from nuke plants or
weapons testing fallout... |
... a chest x-ray... |
'You don't ingest or inhale the radiation source from x-rays. An x-ray lasts for a millisecond. Fallout lingers
in body tissue and bones for decades .' |
| ...about your exposure to fallout from nuke plants or
weapons testing fallout... |
...eating a banana |
'Potassium-40 is a naturally occurring radioisotope that
has been present in foods and the environment on Earth for billions of
years. Potassium 40, which at normal body levels delivers an annual internal dose to the soft tissue of 20 millirem and 5 millirem to the bone, is not as
hazardous as many forms of anthropogenic (meaning: artificial; manmade) radiation for several
reasons. One main reason is, unlike many types of manmade fission products, its environmental
levels rarely peak to hundreds or thousands of times normal levels. Since 1945, we've
seen a cycle of drastic rising and falling of levels of environmental anthropogenic radiation with nuclear accidents, non-accident releases,
radioactivity blowing around, etc... Another reason: some forms of anthropogenic radiation in the body do
much more damage than potassium-40 for the same quantity of radiation. Dose tables printed in
a 1970s document (NUREG 1.109 rev. 1 Oct. '77) by the NRC paint a spooky, yet realistic, picture for what happens to a radiation sensitive organ, the thyroid, when iodine-131 is consumed. A NRC formula indicates that 1,000 picocuries of iodine-131 gives a dose of 80 millirems to the adult thyroid and 140 millirems to the thyroid of an infant.
|
| ...about your exposure to fallout from nuke plants or
weapons testing fallout... |
...standing next to a smoke alarm.... |
'You don't ingest or inhale the Americium-241 from smoke
alarms. You're talking about the small gamma component of
Am-241. That's external exposure.' |
| ...about elevated radiation levels found in air, water,
or food linked to a planned or accidental release of nuclear poisons... |
...
'levels of concern' or action limits... |
Phrases like 'level of concern' reflect a decision by government to
tolerate a predictable amount of cancer mortalities and genetic defects
in the wake of a nuclear accident or mishap. Every single
'permissible level' - including a 'level of concern' - comes with a
supply of several body bags. Consider: if food in the U.S. reached the permissible levels
for radiation, then vulnerable
members of the population would receive multiple occurrences of 0.5 Rem doses over a year. Per the government, a per-person dose of 0.5 Rems in a population
would result in an estimated 2.25 excess fatal cancers, on average, per 10,000 persons. The late radiobiologist John Gofman
argued that the actual mortality rate is six times higher (meaning
13.5 fatal cancers). Most permissible levels are not credible
because they are based on a study of atomic bomb survivors
that deliberately ignored the exposures of Japanese populations to
fallout dust. To paraphrase the belief of the journalist Norman Cousins on this issue:
The proper amount of manmade radiation in the body is no manmade radiation. |
