Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Propaganda: "100 Millisieverts OK"

Last night my relatives visited for dinner. When the conversation touched on Fukushima, they told me authoritatively that they heard on the "news" that exposure levels of 100 millisieverts or less are "safe" and "fine."

This assertion that radiation levels of 100 millisieverts or less is safe is simply not supported by the vast majority of studies on the subject of human exposure to low levels of ionizing radiation.

There is currently a CONCERTED PROPAGANDA offensive under way in Japan and the US to persuade publics that the human body can repair damage caused by ionizing radiation levels under the 100 millisieverts.

I am in a rush this morning so I will simply enumerate some of the most compelling arguments against this assertion.

First of all, every human body is different. Embryos, fetuses, children, immune compromised, and elderly populations are going to be much more susceptible to irreparable damage from ionizing radiation.

The idea that all of us are "ok" under a certain limit is simply false.

The inappropriate universalization of this 100 millisieverts points to the fraud at the heart of the argument.

Second, there is compelling evidence that for ADULTS, every 10 millisieverts of radiation over 10 millisieverts produces a 3% increase in cancer over a 5 year period.

Third, this 100 millisievert exposure limit does not distinguish between radiation that is accidentally consumed and inhaled on the one hand, and radiation exposure that comes from a brief X-Ray or CT scan on the other.

Internal exposure is continuous as radioactive nuclides decay, bombarding cells with gamma rays and electrons (depending upon the radionuclide).

So, the universalization of 100 millisieverts is truly utterly spurious.

The (false) conviction of these reports is designed to calm the viewer/reader.

It also shifts the risk of environmental catastrophes to individuals who bear the catastrophes' health and psychological traumas.


Mangano, J. & Sherman, J. (2012). An Unexpected Mortality Increase in the United States Following Arrival of the Radioactive Plume from Fukushima: Is There a Correlation? International Journal of Health Services, 42(1): 47-62.
•Excess mortality statistics by independent researcher Robert Soltysik http://freepdfhosting.com/ccafb5715d.pdf http://i40.tinypic.com/2q39p8p.jpg

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). 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
New Research on childhood leukemia and nuclear plants suggests significant health effects from low levels of ionizing radiation International Journal of Cancer study by C. Sermage-Faure, D. Laurier, S. Goujon-Bellec, M. Chartier, A. Guyot-Goubin, J. Rudant, D. Hemon and J. Clavel, “Childhood leukemia around French nuclear power plants – the Geocap study, 2002 – 2007,http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.27425/pdf.
Prof. Yuri Bandazhevsky found that children contaminated with cesium-137 producing 50 disintegrations per second (becquerels) per kilogram of body weight suffered irreversible heart damage . (Starrr, S. 2012 Health Threat From Cesium 1-137. Japan Times Feb 16. Available:http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/rc20120216a1.html

Genomic Damage in Children Accidently Exposed to Ionizing Radiation: A  Review of the Literature. Fucic, A. et al. (2008). Mutation Research, 658, 111-123. “Overall, the evidence from the studies…reveals consistently increased chromosome aberration and micronuclei frequency in exposed than in referent children”





1 comment:

  1. Hi Majia,

    Monday evening I had to spend some time in the ER of a large Chicago hospital with a sick relative. It was very busy and they gave a sort of triage report. They had seen 290 patients that day in the ER. That was considered a lot for them. Later upon talking with a nurse I learned that the number of patients (290) was how many they would see on a very busy summer day, when they usually have their highest numbers. The nurse also said they had been having higher numbers of patients over the past few months. She did not know why they seemed to be having an overall increase in the number of patients. It made me think of the study by “Mangano, J. & Sherman, J. (2012). An Unexpected Mortality Increase in the United States…” and I wondered “is radiation impacting the overall immunity of the population causing people to succumb to a variety of illnesses?” It would be interesting to know if other ER’s around the country have seen an increase in their patient numbers.

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