Friday, March 30, 2012

Japanese Government's Evacuation Standard is 20 Millisieverts a Year


from background radiation alone.

Source article:

Gov't to revise evacuation zones in 3 Fukushima municipalities

What are the implications of this ridiculously high levels for adults?
 
"For every 10 mSv of low-dose ionizing radiation, there was a 3% increase in the risk of age- and sex-adjusted cancer over a mean follow-up period of five years (hazard ratio 1.003 per milliSievert, 95% confidence interval 1.002–1.004)." 

Source: Cancer risk related to low-dose ionizing radiation from cardiac imaging in patients after acute myocardial infarction. By M J. Eisenberg, Jonathan A., P.  R. Lawler, M. Abrahamowicz , Hugues R., L. Pilote http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3050947/?tool=pubmed

Majia here: Japan Today is running essentially the same story:

Gov't eases limits in nuclear no-go zone for 1st time. By Mari Yamaguch

[excerpted] "A 20-kilometer zone around the plant has been off-limits to about 100,000 residents for more than a year because of radiation contamination. But the plant was declared stable in December, with leaks substantially subsiding, and that let officials focus on how to clean up the contamination and allow some people to return.
 
On Friday, the government said it was rearranging the evacuation zone based on three categories of contamination, rather than by distance... The change affects three of the 11 municipalities inside the former evacuation zone..."

Majia here: Notice that this article in Japan Today reinforces the "cold shutdown" mythos?

Surprisingly (given the perpetuation of the "cold shutdown" mythology), today's New York Times is reporting that the disaster could be "worse" than previously thought.

One had to wonder why this type of "worse" report is circulating, especially in the context of the article above that re-asserts the cold shutdown mythos?

Japan Nuclear Plant May Be Worse Off Than Thought
By HIROKO TABUCHI March 29, 2012
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/world/asia/inquiry-suggests-worse-damage-at-japan-nuclear-plant.html?_r=1&src=tp

TOKYO — "The damage to one of three stricken reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant could be worse than previously thought, a recent internal investigation has shown, raising new concerns over the plant’s stability and complicating the post-disaster cleanup..."

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