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Skin cancer risk from Airport Radiation Scanning

The research also shows children are more vulnerable to radiation damage, because they have more cells dividing at any one time than when fully grown and a radiation-induced mutation can lead to cancer in adulthood……

Airport scanners may increase risk of cancer Alfred Woody Wang’s Kewl Blog, 20 May 2010, Radiation “dangerously underestimated” * Skin around face, neck most at risk US scientists are warning that radiation from controversial full-body airport scanners has been dangerously underestimated and could lead to an increased risk of skin cancer – particularly in children.

University of California biochemist David Agard said that unlike other scanners, the radiation from these devices is delivered at low energy beam levels, with most of the dose concentrated in the skin and underlying tissue.“While the dose would be safe if it were distributed throughout the volume of the entire body, the dose to the skin may be dangerously high,” Dr Agard said.”Ionizing radiation such as the X-rays used in these scanners have the potential to induce chromosome damage, and that can lead to cancer.”

Of further concern is that a failure in the device – like a power or software glitch – could cause an intense radiation dose to a single spot on the skin.The warnings come ahead of the planned rollout of the scanners in Australia next year as part of the Federal Government’s crackdown on airport security.
David Brenner, the head of Columbia University’s Centre for Radiological Research, says the concentration on the skin – one of the most radiation-sensitive organs of the body – means the radiation dose is actually 20 times higher than the official estimate……….

The researcher was consulted to write guidelines for the security scanners in 2002 but said he would not have signed the report had he known the devices were going to be used so widely.

“There really is no other technology around where we’re planning to X-ray such an enormous number of individuals,” he said. “While individual risks will be extremely small, the population risk has the potential to be significant.”

The research also shows children are more vulnerable to radiation damage, because they have more cells dividing at any one time than when fully grown and a radiation-induced mutation can lead to cancer in adulthood……

Dr Brenner believes millimetre-wave scanners that use radio waves instead of X-rays would be better to use because they have no known radiation risks. Alfred Woody Wang’s Kewl Blog [ 椼仁 ]: ‘Naked’ scanners may increase cancer risk

May 20, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, health | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear technology, nuclear wastes, radiation, radioactive