[ RadSafe ] Risk in general - not radiation-specific

[Stabin, Michael]

>...abuse of the LNT for carcinogens. It's a bad model, not necessarily
because it's wrong (although I think it is), but because it focuses
attention on negligible risk in a vacuum, rather than in the context of
all risks.

Yes, precisely, the key issue. This has been the subject of numerous
very good isolated articles in the past 20-30 years, we have an entire
society with a journal devoted to risk analysis, yet no one can seem to
get this single point addressed in public debate at any significant
level. Microsieverts of radiation exposure, exposure to minor gasoline
fumes from filling your gas tank, trace levels of potential carcinogens
in food, and other either trivial or nonexistent risks garner so much
attention that one would think that we are dealing with industrial
poisoning on the level of the radium dial painters again. Sacks of money
are given away by the federal government to "victims" who do not even
need to show an actual deleterious effect in some cases. Meanwhile real
risks, that cause actual caskets to be filled with bodies on a daily
basis, are not addressed. I suggest that the fault lies with us
scientists as communicators. If we cannot make our arguments
persuasively in the public arena, and cannot dissemble the absurd claims
of the disingenuous groups and individuals that seek to mislead the
public, perhaps we are not as smart as we think we are.


Mike

Michael G. Stabin, PhD, CHP
Assistant Professor of Radiology and Radiological Sciences 
Department of Radiology and Radiological Sciences 
Vanderbilt University 
1161 21st Avenue South
Nashville, TN 37232-2675 
Phone (615) 343-0068
Fax   (615) 322-3764
Pager (615) 835-5153
e-mail     michael.g.stabin at vanderbilt.edu 
internet   www.doseinfo-radar.com