Japan admits more radiation exposures as meltdown fears grow - more details

http://www.allheadlinenews.com/briefs/articles/90039797?Japan%20admits%20more%20radiation%20exposures%20as%20meltdown%20fears%20grow

Almost 200 people may have been exposed to radioactivity from the Fukushima Number-one nuclear power plant that was severely damaged during Japan’s devastating earthquake this week.

The plant’s reactor exploded Saturday, a day after the massive quake and tsunami that killed up to 10,000 people. The government’s nuclear safety agency originally said 22 people had been exposed to radioactive materials because of the hydrogen explosion.

But the Yomiuri Daily newspaper reported that Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said at a press conference that it’s possible that nine out of about 100 residents were exposed to radioactivity when they left the area by bus after being told to evacuate.

About 80,000 Fukushima residents were ordered to evacuate the area.

<more>

But it is likely the true count will not be known until the clusters of birth defects and cancers make it impossible to hide

Sure sounds more like they're "reporting" than "admitting".

Yes... people were exposed to radioactivity. SOME of the stuff was released, so of course people were exposed to it.

The question is... how much. I can't believe how fundamental this is but they can't seem to be bothered to give that last piece of information. When TEPCO had one of their workers exposed during the accident, they reported the exposure right down to the tenth of a mSv. We can easily judge what the guy's prognosis is and whether there's something to be worried about.

It's not "almost 200" people... it's almost certainly thousands. But what we need to know is whether "exposed to radioactivity" means .5 mSv... or 5 mSv... or 500.

It really makes a difference. It's harder when you're not talking about a nuclear worker (who wears a measurement all the time), but they should be able to give a pretty acurate range.

The measurements they did were not described in enough detail to say anything meaningful about health effects.

According to a rather confusing table from a Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency press release: (errors in original)



It sounds to me as if they only did measurements on 9 people from the buses, so the measurable exposure overall is more like 4 people out of nine than 9 out of 100. The counts per minute value aren't a very useful measure; we don't know what isotopes are contributing to those counts or how that translates into each individual's recent past and future exposure levels. All they really tell us is that there's evidence of radioactive contamination.

So let's just assume that it's reasonably efficient equipment.

I know that first-responders to potential radiological events are trained to send people home and tell them to shower if the cpm is below 10,000 (assuming a widespread event). Up to 100,000 would be sent to a more thorough shower (some form of decon unit), but still not be in any real danger.

Only when you get over 100,000 cpm would you assume that the person has some internal contamination and warrant additional evaluation.

In short - there isn't much cause for concern based on these numbers. Well... better put there IS cause for concern. That one passenger might be .5% more likely to get some form of solid cancer 20 years from now... but compared to the overall crisis in Japan, this is small potatoes (again, based on these numbers)

Based on some made up numbers, there is no cause for concern?
Or did you have some information to cite?