Lack of attention over Fukushima - Page 3

On January 16 2014 15:12 lichter wrote:
This chart is also pretty good at showing how ridiculous most of our 'radiation' concerns are

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On January 16 2014 20:16 BoggieMan wrote:

The radiation from Chernobyl reached Finland, Sweden, Germany, Denmark, Poland, Norway, Ukraine etc...

On January 16 2014 15:12 lichter wrote:
This chart is also pretty good at showing how ridiculous most of our 'radiation' concerns are

On January 18 2014 02:40 ggrrg wrote:


This chart is extremely misleading. It's using random examples which are absolutely incomparable. Why do they compare one year of normal exposure to 2 weeks in the Fukushima exclusion zone? Why does the normal exposure figure include all radiation sources including food, travel and medical examinations while the Fukushima figure only accounts for radiation in the environment? Is the mammogram figure right next to the "2 weeks at Fukushima exclusion zone" figure supposed to tell me that staying at the contaminated environment is just as safe or as dangerous as this medical exam? Is the reader supposed to know that the benefit of mammograms does not outweigh the risks in women under 40? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammography) Are all the medical scans mentioned in the chart even comparable to living in a contaminated area, considering that most people are scanned rarely (not at all), while living in an irradiated zone means constant exposure?

Furthermore, there is a distinct lack of any explanation and comparison of the different dangers associated with the different radioactive elements released in Fukushima. For example, you can be fine living next to a relatively large quantity of Caesium-137 as long as you keep a distance of say 10m all the time. You'll barely be able to measure any radiation from it unless you place it right on top of your Geiger counter. However, already miniscule amounts of Caesium-137 in your body can lead to cancer. Such exposure can occur e.g. from food. Since it has been released in Fukushima, there is a very valid concern that contaminated food might pose a serious health risk to the population. Pretty much the same applies Strontium-90.

Also, the chart fails to demonstrate what kind of effect even a small increase in health risk has on a large population. Let's say, there is an incidence of cancer related to increased radiation of 0.5%. For a single person, the danger is barely increased. In a population of 1 million however, there would be 5000 cases of cancer due to this radiation.

Overall, this chart is completely useless to anyone who has no previous knowledge about radiation.
Additionally, it is very misleading for assessing the dangers of the radiation released in Fukushima since it completely omits the danger from short-to-medium-lifetime fission products, which are the most accute health concern