Slow motion japanese nuclear genocide of childhood.
Radiation for Children's Day: Japan Callously Puts Thousands of Kids in Harm's Way
May 4, 2011 by Paul
By ROBERT ALVAREZ
May 5 is Children's Day, a Japanese national holiday that celebrates the happiness of childhood. This year, it will fall under a dark, radioactive shadow.
Japanese children in the path of radioactive plumes from the crippled nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi power station are likely to suffer health problems that a recent government action will only exacerbate.
On April 19, the Japanese government sharply ramped up its radiation exposure limit to 2,000 millirem per year (20 mSv/y) for schools and playgrounds in Fukushima prefecture. Japanese children are now permitted to be exposed to an hourly dose rate 165 times above normal background radiation and 133 times more than levels the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency allows for the American public. Japanese school children will be allowed to be exposed to same level recommended by the International Commission on Radiation Protection for nuclear workers. Unlike workers, however, children won't have a choice as to whether they can be so exposed.
This decision callously puts thousands of children in harm's way.
Experts consider children to be 10 to 20 times more vulnerable to contracting cancer from exposure to ionizing radiation than adults. This is because as they grow, their dividing cells are more easily damaged allowing cancer cells to form. Routine fetal X-rays have ceased worldwide for this reason. Cancer remains a leading cause of death by disease for children in the United States.
On April 12, the Japanese government announced that the nuclear crisis in Fukushima was as severe as the 1986 Chernobyl accident. Within weeks of the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami, the four ruined reactors at the Dai-Ichi power station released enormous quantities of radiation into the atmosphere.
According to the Daily Youmiri, Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) announced that between 10 and 17 million curies (270,000- 360,000 TBq) of radioactive materials were released to the atmosphere before early April, a great deal more than previous official estimates.
Even though atmospheric releases blew mostly out to sea and appear to have declined dramatically, NISA reports that Fukushima's nuclear ruins are discharging about 4,200 curies of iodine-131 and cesium-137 per day into the air (154 TBq). This is nearly 320,000 times more than d radiation the now de-commissioned Connecticut Yankee nuclear power plant released over a year. NISA's estimate is likely to be the low end, given the numerous sources of unmeasured and unfiltered leaks into the environment amidst the four wrecked reactors. On April 27, Bloomberg News reported that radiation readings at the Dai-Ichi nuclear power station have risen to the highest levels since the earthquake.
With a half-life of 8.5 days, iodine-131 is rapidly absorbed in dairy products and in the human thyroid, particularly those of children. Cesium-137 has a half-life of 30 years and gives off potentially dangerous external radiation. It concentrates in various foods and is absorbed throughout the human body. Unlike iodine-131, which decays to a level considered safe after about three months, cesium-137 can pose risks for several hundred years.
Measurements taken at 1,600 nursery schools, kindergartens, and middle school playgrounds in early April indicate that children are regularly getting high radiation doses. Radiation levels one meter above the ground indicate that children at hundreds of schools received exposures 43- 200 times above background. And this is outside of the "exclusionary zone" around the Dai-Ichi reactors, where locals have been evacuated. Japan's Ministry of Education and Science has limited outdoor activities at 13 schools in the cities of Fukushima, Date, and Koriyama Cities.
Although the extent of long-term contamination is not yet fully known, disturbing evidence is emerging. Data collected 40 kilometers from the Fukushima's nuclear accident show cumulative levels as high as 9.5 rems (95 mSv) nearly five times the international annual occupational dose. Soil beyond the 30-kilometer evacuation zone shows cesium-137 levels at 2,200 kBq per square meter 67 percent greater than that requiring evacuation near Chernobyl.
Three-fourths of the monitored schools in Fukushima had radioactivity levels so high that human entry shouldn't be allowed, even though students began a new semester on April 5.
Robert Alvarez, an Institute for Policy Studies senior scholar, served as senior policy adviser to the Energy Department's secretary from 1993 to 1999. www.ips-dc.org
Tokyo - Schools in
Tokyo - Schools in north-eastern Japan started Wednesday to remove radiation-contaminated soil from their playgrounds.
The city of Koriyama in Fukushima prefecture was the first municipality to start getting rid of the contaminated topsoil since the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was crippled by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, Jiji Press reported. The plant as been leaking radioactive substances ever since.
Work to remove about 3 centimetres of topsoil was carried out Wednesday at an elementary school and a nursery located about 50 kilometres west of the troubled plant. The soil will be transported to the city's landfill.
The local government implements the safety measure if radiation levels at a point 1 centimetre above ground reach 3.8 microsievert per hour for elementary and junior high schools, and 3 microsievert for nurseries.
Fifteen elementary and junior high schools and 13 nursery schools are subject to the measure, aimed at easing concerns among parents although the current radiation levels are unlikely cause major harm to children, an unnamed local official was quoted by Jiji was saying.
I have come back from
I have come back from Fukushima late last night. I spent five days there.
I visited some towns and villages over there including Iitate-village, where they have highly contamination even outside of 30 km zone. They have 6,000 residents before the earthquake and accident. Some of them have already evacuated voluntarily even before the government set of the "planned evacuation zone". (You may already read the report on the measurement of radiation dose and radioactive materials in soil in the village.)
It is really urgent to let people, especially children, pregnant women and younger people (who may have children in the future), evacuate from such a highly contaminated area. I met the head of the village and some staff members of the village. I also met with some groups of residents. I told them the real situation of the contamination in their village and explained them that it is urgent to decide to evacuate. (Some residents do not want to evacuate as they have their own life in their beautiful homeland. However, they are starting to understand what is happening in their land.) I also listen to their stories individually and gave them concrete advices as a physician. It is really sensitive situation in many ways, politically, socially and psychologically, so I cannot write all the things at this moment here. You, who are living outside of Japan, might not understand our Japanese culture, though.
I is really sad and terrible for me to see and hear that people, including babies (some dozens of babies, infants, their mothers and pregnant women have already evacuated under a official program of the village, but not all of the babies are evacuated) have been living in such an area where we can measure such radiation level (ex. indoor: 2-3 micro Sv/h, outside: 5-8 micro Sv/h at 1m above the ground, more than 10 micro Sv/h on the ground).
Some NGOs and individuals from outside are now helping people in the village by supplying non-contaminated vegetable, fruits and such fresh food. They need to have non-comtaminated food anyway before evacuation. The evacuation plan takes at least one month.
As you may know that some "specialists" say openly in public that radiation (chronic) exposure below 100 mSv makes no serious health problem. They, together with the local authority, had lectures in many places in the prefecture. They want to avoid the panic situation of people. I understand their concern, though. However, such comments of them influenced people to take their situation easy. Some families who once evacuated outside of the highly contaminated area came back to the village after having lectures and information from such specialists.
I am thinking to visit the area again early next month after the events of 25th anniversary of Chernobyl here in Osaka. I would like to help them as a physician to let them decide themselves what to do. I want to be with them, as far as I can, and work in cooperation with them. I really do not want to make people in panic. It is important to talk to the people and listen to the people directly and think with them what to do in such a critical situation.
I would add that even outside of the Iitate-village, the radiation situation is still serious.
We can measure 1-3 micro Sv/h radiation rate all around in the center of the city of Fukushima, where 290,000 people are living. The problem is not limited at the schools. The "20 mSv" of radiation exposure (it is only from external exposure) is a serious problem for almost all of the residents in the contaminated cities and towns in Fukushima prefecture. Of course, "20 mSv" is the dose limit for nuclear workers in Japan in accordance to the Japanese radiation protection low. The radiation level above 0.6 micro Sv/h (1.3 mSv of radiation exposure) is the definition of the "radiation control area" according to the law. However, they are now applying the standards of "emergency version" for both workers and public following the recommendation of ICRP.
As many people are already exposed to some extent, proper health following-up and compensation will be necessary in the future.
We also have to think about the influence to the industry, agriculture dairy farming and fishing in the area. Many people are living on that.
We really need to stop all the nuclear power plants in Japan (and everywhere in the world). I know that we cannot stop them immediately, though. We, as citizens groups, will visit the Kansai-electric company to request them to listen our voices on April 26. We have 10 nuclear power plants just 100 km from Osaka, the second biggest city in Japan. We know that there are active faults very close to the plants.
I agree with the idea of Alex to make a kind of appeal from IPPNW on this occasion to support the exposed people in Japan. I think it important to make a critical comments on ICRP and Japanese government's policy of radiation protection at the emergency situation. (Note that Japanese government are following the recommendation form ICRP and many physicians and specialists in Japan have been supporting ICRP. The special adviser for the Japanese cabinet at the emergency situation is a member of ICRP.)
Sorry, but I do not have time to write more in detail now. (I have to prepare the meeting tomorrow.)
The situation is moving here in Japan. I have to work on it, as a physician, in accordance to my conscience.
Thank you for all the support from our colleagues of IPPNW in the world.
Peace,
Katsumi
On 2011/04/21, at 19:18,
Dear friends,
we have just heard the news that the Japanese Ministry of Education has raised the permissible dose limit for radiation of children in kindergartens, nursery, primary and junior high schools in the Fukushima Prefecture to a staggering 3.8 microSv per hour. Depending on the amount of time spent outside, this new limit can amount to close to 20 mSv per year of total radiation dose.
many countries the upper radiation exposure limit for workers at nuclear power plants! An article about this can be viewed at http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20110420p2a00m0na011000c.html
Research has shown that even for an adult population, this politically set limit of 20 mSv per year is much to high and low dose radiation can not only cause cancer, but also cardiovascular disease, visual impairment, gastrointestinal diseases and neurologic damage http://www.chernobylcongress.org/fileadmin/user_upload/pdfs/chernob_repo...
We also know that children have a much higher radiosensitivity than adults. Their tissues proliferate much more rapidly and their cell repair mechanisms and protective systems against oxidative stress and DNA mutations are not yet fully developed. The younger the children are, the more harmful the effect of radiation can be for their health. This is why children need much lower radiation exposure limits than adults and definitely than workers in nuclear plants.
As IPPNW we have to condemn this politically motivated step of the Japanese government. to raise the limit for radiation exposure of vulnerable young children to that of nuclear workers. Already, parents in Japan are protesting the move and Greenpeace has declared that it would support local initiatives in their fight against these new limits.
I think that we as doctors have an obligation to become involved and raise our voice – here inGermany, in Japan and all over the world…
I think that the next few days will see an unprecedented public interest in the topic of radiation health effects due to the situation in Japan and the 25th anniversary of the nuclear meltdown in Chernobyl.
All the best from Germany,
A Rosen
Children Don Masks, Hats in
Children Don Masks, Hats in Fukushima as Radiation Looms
By Takahiko Hyuga and Shigeru Sato - May 11, 2011 11:13 AM GMT+0200
Students at the Shoyo Junior High School in Fukushima are wearing masks, caps and long-sleeved jerseys to attend classes as their exposure to radiation is on pace to equal annual limits for nuclear industry workers.
“Students are told not to go out to the school yard and we keep windows shut,” said Yukihide Sato, the vice principal at Shoyo Junior High in Date city, about 60 kilometers (37 miles) northwest from the crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear station. “Things are getting worse, but I don’t know what to do.”
Two months after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami created Japan’s worst nuclear crisis since World War II, schools in Fukushima are waiting for stronger measures from the government to protect its youngest citizens. A parents group is petitioning Governor Yuhei Sato to evacuate more than 1,600 kindergartens, elementary and junior high schools which would affect about 300,000 children and teachers.
“The governor should take leadership,” said Seiichi Nakate, the 50-year-old head of the Network to Protect Fukushima Children from Radiation, a group comprising 250 parents. “Fukushima Prefecture is the only power that can protect our children from radiation exposure.”
Thirty-five members of the parents group met with Yuichi Matsumoto, an official of the prefecture’s disaster task force, for 90 minutes today, Nakate said. The Fukushima government accepted the petition and will decide on a response, said Masafumi Mizuguchi, another official at the task force.
National Decisions
Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s administration has led rescue and evacuation efforts since the quake decimated towns and left more than 24,000 dead or missing. Decisions to remove contaminated materials in Fukushima prefecture have been left to the central government because local authorities don’t have the expertise or knowledge, said an official at the prefecture’s education department, who declined to be named.
Children and teachers at a fifth of the 1,600 schools in Fukushima are receiving at least 20 millisieverts of radiation per year, said Nakate, according to readings from the government. That’s the limit for a nuclear power plant worker, according to Japan’s nuclear safety commission.
More than three-quarters of the schools receive radiation readings of 0.6 microsievert per hour, Nakate said. That’s 10 times more than the readings in Shinjuku, central Tokyo last week. A chest X-ray delivers a radiation dose of about 100 microsieverts, or 0.1 millisievert, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. A millisievert is 1,000 microsieverts.
‘Phone Calls’
“We are waiting for the national government’s advice and asking them for appropriate ways to deal with the situation,” Hisashi Katayose, an official at the Fukushima prefecture government’s disaster task force, said yesterday. “We’ve received several phone calls from residents and been asked to reduce radiation levels at schools.”
Governor Sato on May 2 had asked the national government to determine appropriate measures to prevent the situation from getting worse.
Readings at Shoyo Junior High reached 3.3 microsieverts an hour on May 2, according to Date city’s education board. The school, which has 245 students and 27 teaching staff, bans female students from wearing skirts, citing radiation concerns, said Vice Principal Sato.
Date city’s government in late April removed contaminated soil from playgrounds at two elementary schools and one day care facility after requests from local residents, said Hiroshi Ono, an official at the city’s board of education. Radiation readings had exceeded 3.8 microsieverts an hour, he said.
The soil was left at the corners of the playgrounds and covered with plastic sheets as a temporary measure, Ono said in a phone interview.
To contact the reporters on this story: Takahiko Hyuga in Tokyo at thyuga@bloomberg.net; Shigeru Sato in Tokyo at ssato10@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Chitra Somayaji at csomayaji@bloomberg.net; Teo Chian Wei at cwteo@bloomberg.net
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Children of Fukushima need
Children of Fukushima need our protection
By Tilman Ruff
MELBOURNE, April 26, Kyodo
I was dismayed to learn that the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology earlier this week increased the allowable dose of ionizing radiation for children in Fukushima Prefecture.
The dose they set, 3.8 microsieverts per hour, equates to more than 33 millisieverts (mSv) over a year. This is to apply to children in kindergartens, nursery, primary and junior high schools. Let me try to put this in perspective.
Widely accepted science tells us that the health risk from radiation is proportional to the dose -- the bigger the dose the greater the risk, and there is no level without risk.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection recommends that all radiation exposure be kept as low as achievable, and for the public, on top of background radiation and any medical procedures, should not exceed 1 mSv per year.
For nuclear industry workers, they recommend a maximum permissible annual dose of 20 mSv averaged over five years, with no more than 50 mSv in any one year.
In Japan the maximum allowed annual dose for workers, 100 mSv, was already higher than international standards. This has been increased in response to the Fukushima disaster to 250 mSv.
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences BEIR VII report estimates that each 1 mSv of radiation is associated with an increased risk of solid cancer (cancers other than leukemia) of about 1 in 10,000; an increased risk of leukemia of about 1 in 100,000; and a 1 in 17,500 increased risk of dying from cancer.
But a critical factor is that not everyone faces the same level of risk. For infants (under 1 year of age) the radiation-related cancer risk is 3 to 4 times higher than for adults; and female infants are twice as susceptible as male infants.
Females' overall risk of cancer related to radiation exposure is 40 percent greater than for males. Fetuses in the womb are the most radiation-sensitive of all.
The pioneering Oxford Survey of Childhood Cancer found that X-rays of mothers, involving doses to the fetus of 10-20 mSv, resulted in a 40 percent increase in the cancer rate among children up to age 15.
In Germany, a recent study of 25 years of the national childhood cancer register showed that even the normal operation of nuclear power plants is associated with a more than doubling of the risk of leukemia for children under 5 years old living within 5 kilometers of a nuclear plant.
Increased risk was seen to more than 50 km away. This was much higher than expected, and highlights the particular vulnerability to radiation of children in and outside the womb.
In addition to exposure measured by typical external radiation counters, the children of Fukushima will also receive internal radiation from particles inhaled and lodged in their lungs, and taken in through contaminated food and water.
A number of radioactive substances are concentrated up the food chain and in people. As a parent, as a physician, the decision to allow the children of Fukushima to be exposed to such injurious levels of radiation is an unacceptable abrogation of the responsibility of care and custodianship for our children and future generations.
(Tilman Ruff is chair of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons and associate professor at the Nossal Institute for Global Health at the University of Melbourne, Australia.)
==Kyodo
The map, released May 6, was
The map, released May 6, was compiled from data from a joint aircraft survey undertaken by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and the U.S. Department of Energy.
This is the link for the map made by japanes and US officials.
May 6th 2011
http://www.mext.go.jp/component/english/__icsFiles/afieldfile/2011/05/10...
It showed that a belt of contamination, with 3 million to 14.7 million becquerels of cesium-137 per square meter, spread to the northwest of the nuclear plant.
After the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, those living in areas with more than 555,000 becquerels of cesium-137 per square meter were forced to relocate. However, the latest map shows that accumulated radioactivity exceeded this level at some locations outside the official evacuation zones, including the village of Iitate and the town of Namie.
"I am surprised by the extent of the contamination and the vast area it covers," said Tetsuji Imanaka, assistant professor of nuclear engineering at the Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute.
The U.S. Department of Energy used an airplane and a helicopter to survey the area within a 60-km radius of the plant, while the ministry hired a private helicopter to scan the area within 60 to 80 km.