Thom Hartmann - TSA & Cancer clusters

http://www.truth-out.org/news-thom-hartmann-tsa-agents-working-radiation-machines-develop-cancer-and-more/1309449287

And the TSA is still not allowing their clerks to wear dosimeters?

Edit to add link

already is a load of horse shit.

People don't die from cancer within a year of exposure to radiation. If there is strong enough radiation to cause cancer to go crazy within a year, the person would be dying from radiation poisoning first.

"Falling ill with cancer clusters?" A cancer cluster is an area where cancer rates are abnormally higher than in standard populations, not a disease to fall ill from. Way to spread bad information, Mr. Hartmann. This incompetence in reporting makes it harder to get the point across.

And I fucking HATE the scanners.

Iirc

Have managed to avoid them and have only alarmed the WTMD once and that was in Paris.

If they are not that is appalling. If they are, then there is a record of how much radiation they received.
I am wondering if those machines are checked once a year by a radiation physicist.

Said that they were diagnosed with cancer.

Here's a link to EPIC and their FOIA request.

http://epic.org/privacy/airtravel/backscatter/

According to the documents obtained through the FOIA by EPIC, only TSA agents at Logan are getting increased reports of cancer.

There will be more.

Since there is a large increase at only one location, that indicates to me that it could certainly be any number of things. If there were at least small increases at other airports, I would be inclined to agree but that does not seem to be the case, just a large increase at one location.

There is more weird about it as well. Why just an increase in TSA agents? There are more people that are near them a lot every day as well... Security, they are right there all day as well... I'm sure people that work on the concourse pass through any number of times a day... Why just the one group? Makes no sense to me. Also, it is not like any of these groups are actually being scanned, they are just near the machines. A very odd story.

This article may be about the luggage xray equipment, they have been around for at least 20 years.

All radiation equipment has to be strictly periodically calibrated for optimum safety. If this is not being done, or the lead flaps on those scanners allow leaks, people sitting right in front of the scanners could absolutely be at risk.

I don't know if they are all wearing dosimeters, but they better be--then they can track the unsafe machines.

Radiation exposure to the public is best handled with strict oversight, and I think that as our infrastructure loses funding, safety and maintenance are the first things to be cut from budgets. The corporations work very hard to cover this up.

TSA workers need to unionize. Here is a link to documents obtained through freedom of information act:

http://epic.org/privacy/airtravel/backscatter/epic_v_dhs_radiation.html#foia

Looks like TSA workers could have a case, if not allowed to wear monitoring devices. This is a standard for all medical radiation workers to be monitored, and gross negligence for exposed airport scan workers to not be given dosimeters!

TSA's lack of concern for the safety of it's own workers is an indication of their lack of concern for the general public.

we were tested weekly to make sure our radiation level wasn't too high.If it was,we were not allowed to enter a radiation area for a set period of time.
Older x-ray docs I know got a lot of facial and thyroid cancers.