In tears, Nuclear Adviser to PM Kan quits over raising safe limits for children "20 times too high"

[flamingdem]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/04/30/nuclear-japan-resignation.html

SEE VIDEO from 4/30:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXwpU78h93Y

A senior nuclear adviser to Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has resigned, criticizing the government for ignoring his advice on radiation limits and not doing enough to deal with the crisis at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Toshiso Kosako, a professor at the University of Tokyo, was only recently named an aide to Kan on March 16, five days after a magnitude-9.0 earthquake and tsunami hit Japan

In a teary news conference on Friday night, Kosako said he could not stay on while the government set, what he deemed, inappropriate radiation limits for elementary schools near the plant.

"I cannot allow this as a scholar," he said, adding that he also opposed the government raising the limit for radiation exposure for workers at the plant.

The government has set 20-millisievert limit for radiation exposure as safe, but according to Kosako, that is 20 times too high, especially for children, who are considered more vulnerable to radiation than adults.

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[caraher]

1. They're making it up as they go along

It seems clear that these moving-target exposure limits Japan keeps announcing are driven less by radiation biology than by some calculation of how large they want the scope of this event to appear. Don't want ghost towns near the plant? Raise the legal limit. 20 mSv is at least 4 times the largest annual dose I received on the job in my 6 years working in nuclear medicine, and I wouldn't want my kids exposed at that level.

I think one probably can make a case for allowing exposures at that level, but doing so in the wake of an accident smacks of opportunism. And at the very least they should tell parents that they used to have one standard, but now the standard is different, and here's the estimated risk increase; but more likely they'll declare this or that area "safe" without a nuanced discussion of risks.

[flamingdem]

2. I agree, they may have to do certain things for practical reasons

but from what I can tell they are not properly and responsibly informing the public about serious choices that they must make for their families. I cannot fathom why they are allowing children to go to a school where the topsoil is being removed due to radioactivity. My sense is that ignorance plays a role here and the government is banking on lack of knowledge about the damaging effects of low (and medium) level radiation.

[RC]

3. There is no such think as 0 radiation on this planet.

"The government has set 20-millisievert limit for radiation exposure as safe, but according to Kosako, that is 20 times too high, especially for children, who are considered more vulnerable to radiation than adults."

People need to get realistic here. Everything from bricks to bananas are national radioactive. Even you are naturally radioactive. And not from any Human actives either.

[flamingdem]

4. There is nothing natural about the cesium, plutonium, iodine being found in soil there nt

[caraher]

5. Sure, there's plenty of natural radiation

But this is in addition to the natural radiation, and the proposed limit is several times the typical background dose. I put not stock in the theory that radiation from reactors is intrinsically more dangerous than that from natural sources, but I put even less stock in your suggestion that the existence of natural radiation sources implies that additional radiation is of no consequence.

Quadrupling the dose from background is not going to wipe out life as we know it, but it poses a distinct risk. The usual linear no-threshold calculation back-of-the-envelope correlates 2000 person-rem of exposure to the general population with one additional cancer death. 20 mSv is 2 rem, so if you expose 1000 people to this level for a year you'd expect one additional cancer. If you're talking about a population of children the risk is probably higher.

You simply can't get this much additional dose by eating bananas or downing KCl rather than NaCl in your cooking. Being realistic does include being quantitative in a way that clearly points to an arguably small but definable risk to health.

[flamingdem]

6. Our bodies handle bananas WITH NO PROBLEMS!

So let's stop with that BS.

Let's talk about what cesium, iodine and plutonium does to the body. Please.

There is zero reason to attempt to equate these sources of radiation.

[robinlynne]

8. Thank-you.

[reggie the dog]

7. one 20th of 20 millisievert

would be 1 millisievert, not zero.

[Someguyinjapan]

9. Funny how we're not seeing the naysayers/deniers

Here telling us that it's not that bad, there is no official-level delay or obfuscation of data, that the authorities here are completely trustworthy. Although I suspect that virtually all of these types aren't living here either.