nuclear-news

Inadequacy of Fukushima radiation tests – to avoid “uneasiness”

Fukushima Prefecture asked university to stop radiation dose tests soon after disaster, The Mainichi, 14 June 12, The Fukushima Prefectural Government asked a research team from Hirosaki University to stop conducting internal radiation exposure tests on prefectural residents after the outbreak of the Fukushima nuclear disaster on the grounds that the tests were “stirring uneasiness,” it has been learned.

A prefectural government official said the assertion couldn’t be
confirmed, but commented, “At the time, research was being conducted
by various sources, and we received complaints that it was ‘stirring
uneasiness.’ We told research organizations to be ‘cautious’ (with
investigations), and I think Hirosaki University was one of those
organizations.”

The university’s research team has questioned the prefecture’s actions.

“If proper tests had been carried out, then we could have accurately
evaluated the effects of the nuclear crisis, and residents would have
felt more at ease,” a member of the university’s research team
commented.
Shinji Tokonami, a professor at Hirosaki University’s Institute of
Radiation Emergency Medicine, and other research team members measured
the level of radioactive iodine-131 in the thyroid glands of 62 people
between April 12 and 16 last year, soon after the outbreak of the
Fukushima nuclear crisis, with the permission of residents and local
bodies. At the time, 17 of the people were residing in the Tsushima
district of the Fukushima Prefecture town of Namie, which was later
designated as a “planned evacuation zone” due to the detection of high
levels of radiation. The remaining 45 people had evacuated from
Minamisoma city to Fukushima city. Three of the subjects were tested
twice.

To improve the accuracy of the measurements, it is widely viewed as
necessary to extend the number of tested subjects to three figures,
and researchers had planned further examinations. However, the team
said it was contacted by Fukushima Prefecture’s Local Medical Care
Division, which reportedly told them, “It’s all right to measure
environmental levels, but testing people stirs uneasiness, so we would
like you to stop it.”

Iodine-131, which was released during the nuclear disaster,
accumulates easily in the thyroid glands. While it is said to increase
the risk of cancer, it has a short half-life of eight days, and unless
tests for it are conducted at an early stage, it is hard to judge the
effects of a nuclear accident.

“The reason anxiety about radiation has become prolonged is that we
have no information from that time (soon after the outbreak of the
nuclear disaster),” Tokonami said…….
Test data from the 62 people has already been publicly announced.
According to estimates based on the assumption that the residents
inhaled radioactive iodine on March 12 last year — the day after the
Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima No. 1
Nuclear Power Plant — five people were deemed to have received an
accumulated dose higher than the International Atomic Energy Agency’s
50-millisievert threshold for recommending the use of iodine pills to
prevent cancer. However, it is now believed that residents inhaled
radioactive iodine on March 15, 2011, and so the test data is being
re-analyzed.

The central government headquarters for nuclear disaster
countermeasures conducted internal exposure tests on 1,080 people
between the age of 0 and 15 in the village of Iitate and other areas
in late March, but these were simple tests in which radioactive iodine
could not be measured directly.
http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20120614p2a00m0na010000c.html

June 15, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | health, Japan, secrets,lies and civil liberties