AW: AW: [ RadSafe ] Child cancer risk higher near German nuclearplants

Fri Dec 14 13:04:43 CST 2007

Franz,

your additional information sheds some more light on the real background of this 'affair' and I know nothing which would contradict it.

Regarding the political leadership of a ministry I agree that specific know-how should not be the prime criterion for its selection (although I would prefer e.g. a minister for agriculture who is able to distinguish oat from wheat or a bull from an ox :-). 

Regarding the administration of a regular authority such as the BfS, I wonder whether common sense alone would be sufficient to wield proper leadership and authority on a staff of experts if I couldn't tell an X from an U. But of course, if his mission were to nourish radiophobia (as it well may have been intended by the minister who installed him) ignorance could be an asset.

Regarding the well-known leukaemia clusters I once more remind of Kinlen's (and others) "population mixing" cause.

Regards, Rainer

________________________________

Von: Franz Schönhofer [mailto:franz.schoenhofer at chello.at]
Gesendet: Fr 14.12.2007 18:59
An: Facius, Rainer; bcradsafers at hotmail.com; radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: AW: AW: [ RadSafe ] Child cancer risk higher near German nuclearplants

Björn, Rainer, RADSAFErs,

I intended to answer Björns question by telling him that this piece is not
worth the effort to even type the translation. OK, Rainer did it, but it is
not really useful without background information. Rainer has included a very
short part of background information. May I add some more and ask Rainer to
correct it if I am wrong?

Yes, this "König" (King in English)is the head of the Bundesamt für
Strahlenschutz (BfS). He was "inthroned" by the German Minister of
Environment Trittin, belonging to the Green party a few years ago. This
absolutely antinuclear minister is gone since long, but König might be head
of BfS until retirement. Yes, Rainer is correct - he had been before this
position in one of the German federal states in charge of agriculture,
probably also gardening. He has not the slightest qualification in either
radiation protection, nuclear issues or anything close to them. I believe
that this might not be necessary for a politician, who has the right
advisers - but he has obviously only pressure from the green party.

His comment is even to me as a German native speaker not easily
understandable or probably not understandable at all. Political Bla, bla,
bla. Everything in this statements is at least confusing, twisted etc. etc.

I would recommend that you do not pay attention to it. The claims of
leukemia clusters are nothing new, they have been raised maybe 20 or 15
Years ago, have been invalidated, but they still show up every few years.

Best regards, beste Gruesse, vaenlig haelsning,

Franz

Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] Im Auftrag
von Rainer.Facius at dlr.de
Gesendet: Freitag, 14. Dezember 2007 15:12
An: bcradsafers at hotmail.com; radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: AW: AW: [ RadSafe ] Child cancer risk higher near German
nuclearplants

Bjorn, here my attempt of transliteration [with a few annotations]:

Faulty reckoning?

So it reads in a statement of [BfS-head] König's [external expert]
committee: "Contrary to the study authors, the external expert committee is
unanimously [sic] convinced that due to the particularly high radiation risk
for infants and due to inadequate data on emissions from power reactors,
this connection [with radiation] can not at all be excluded." BfS-head König
concurs with this assessment and thereby contradicts his own [supervising
Umwelt-] minister [Gabriel, a NPP foe] who announced: "The radiation burden
of the public caused by the operation of NPPs in Germany would have to be
higher [than known] by at least a factor of 1000 in order to explain the
observed increase of the cancer risk."

In addition, the [external] experts claim that Maria Blettner's team of
epidemiologists has erroneously reckoned. Although data beyond the radius of
5 kilometers had been ascertained, the team had ignored these data and
thereby [deliberately?] produced too low a risk estimate [- so the
accusation goes].

Peter Kaatsch is Co-author of the study. Since its results are on the public
marketplace his phone hardly stops ringing. He is peeved by the statement of
the expert committee. "We did attune in advance [and in fine detail] the
operations manual and the design of the study with them [the external
experts]." The study team of Mainz is much more guarded in the appraisal of
their findings. They point out that from radiobiological considerations the
emission of a NPP does not suffice to engender cancer or leukaemia in
infants. Kaatsch: "Mountaineering exposes them to significantly higher
levels". Study leader Blettner therefore is irritated by König's pressing
ahead regarding the radiation issue. "If he has evidence [for his claim],
then he knows more than we do", Blettner said in an interview.

Addendum: BfS-head König's (a Green's partisan) expertise is in agriculture,
if I remember correctly.

HTH, Rainer

________________________________

Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl im Auftrag von Bjorn Cedervall
Gesendet: Do 13.12.2007 20:43
An: radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: RE: AW: [ RadSafe ] Child cancer risk higher near German
nuclearplants

Thank you Rainer,

The character of the Swedish massmedial fallout was, as far as I can see,
only another slew of radiophobia. Is there a chance you or some other
Radsafers could summarize the essence of the copy-pasted text below (I
apologize for taking six years of French + some Spanish in my past)?

My personal action only,

Bjorn Cedervall   bcradsafers at hotmail.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------
"Falsch gerechnet?
So heißt es in einer Stellungnahme von Königs Gremium: "Im Gegensatz zu den
Autoren ist das externe Expertengremium einhellig der Überzeugung, dass
aufgrund des besonders hohen Strahlenrisikos für Kleinkinder sowie der
unzureichenden Daten zur Emissionen von Leistungsreaktoren dieser
Zusammenhang keinesfalls ausgeschlossen werden kann." Eine Bewertung, der
sich Amtschef König anschließt und der damit das Gegenteil seines Ministers
sagt, der mitteilen ließ: "Die Strahlenbelastung der Bevölkerung müsste
durch den Betrieb der Atomkraftwerke in Deutschland um mindestens das
1000-Fache höher sein, um den beobachteten Anstieg des Krebsrisikos erklären
zu können."
Auch sagen die Experten, das Team um die Epidemiologin Maria Blettner habe
falsch gerechnet. Sie hätten trotz erhobener Daten die Fälle außerhalb des
Fünfkilometerradius nicht berücksichtigt und so ein zu geringes Risiko
herausbekommen.
Peter Kaatsch ist Co-Autor der Studie. Seit die Ergebnisse auf dem Markt
sind, steht bei ihm das Telefon nicht mehr still. Ihn ärgert die
Stellungnahme des Expertengremiums: "Wir haben das Operationshandbuch für
die Studie und das Studiendesign im Vorfeld mit denen abgestimmt." Die
Mainzer sind bei der Bewertung ihrer Ergebnisse weit zurückhaltender. Sie
verweisen darauf, dass aus strahlenbiologischer Sicht die Emissionen eines
AKWs nicht ausreichten, um Kinderkrebs oder Leukämie zu verursachen.
Kaatsch: "Beim Bergsteigen bekommen sie deutlich mehr ab." Studienleiterin
Blettner zeigt sich deshalb irritiert wegen Königs Strahlenvorstoß. "Wenn er
darauf Hinweise hat, weiß er mehr als wir", sagte sie in einem Interview."
--------------

> In a recent public interview the study leader, Maria Blettner, declared:>
> "The results might well be due to chance." [sic]> >
http://www.welt.de/wissenschaft/krebs/article1454885/Bundesamt_fuer_Strahlen
schutz_im_Zwielicht.html> > What transpires is that again a bunch of
activists with some support even of the BfS (Bundesamt für Strahlenschutz)
distorts and exploits the (somewhat indefinite) outcome of strenuous
painstaking scientific work to nourish yet another time the epidemic in
radiophobia to suit their agenda - whatever that may be.
_________________________________________________________________
The best games are on Xbox 360.  Click here for a special offer on an Xbox
360 Console.
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/hardware/wheretobuy/______________________________
_________________
You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood the
RadSafe rules. These can be found at:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/radsaferules.html

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings visit:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/

_______________________________________________
You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood the
RadSafe rules. These can be found at:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/radsaferules.html

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings visit:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/