[ RadSafe ] Fwd: [New post] Confirming the Toshihide Tsuda Thyroid study findings in Fukushima – Answering the nuclear lobbies questions!

[Roger Helbig]

How sound is Professor Toshihide's science?  -

---------- Forwarded message ----------

by arclight2011part2

Below you will find a most interesting question and answers session.
The controversy began at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan
where the allowed Prof. Toshihide Tsuda MD and PhD to make some claims
concerning the stunning rates of cancer being found in childrens
thyroids after an extensive study of over 300,000 children after the
Fukushima Daichi Nuclear disaster, following the huge Earthquake and
resultant Tsunami. Amongst the casualties of this disaster in Japan,
were an unknown number of radiological victims.

Publised on  on 22nd November 2015

Published by http://www.europeannewsweekly.wordpress.com

Published by Shaun McGee
For some 3 years the Fukushima Medical University has been compiling
data but even though the UN rapponteur was asking for evacuation of
children from some areas, no one was doing anything with the data to
find out if the UN rapponteurs fears were correct or wether the
Science Media Centre UK`s “expert” Geraldine Thomas and friends, was
correct with her claim of “No Health Effects”?
Following the claims of Prof Toshihide Tsuda, the press and health
indutries have remained silent. The real battle ground is being fought
on the comments sections of blogs and newspapers throughout the globe!
People have questions!.
I was challenged by Sam McGill to ask Tsuda San to answer some
questions regarding his claim of;

“I am surprised Tsuda's study even got published, it's that bad. It
looks possibly to have been a political decision to "get discussion
going" as it were. It was accompanied by a piece in the same journal
quietly trashing it.”

Of course, this is the only riteous opinion being made and many
bloggers feel ill equiped to deal with someone of Sam McGill`s
eloquence and knowledge.

Below are the questions from Sam McGill and answers from Prof
Toshihide Tsuda in full. Please share parts or all of these questions
and answers because it will be unlikely that the Japan Times or
similar would be allowed to print this discussion (though I live in
hope) owing to the new Japanese Secrets Law that helps to keep the
press in their place. I thank JT for keeping the comments open so we
could interact with one another and try to find the truth amongst the
untruths. Regards Shaun McGee

Answer to Mr Shaun McGee from Toshide Tsude concerning
issues on the recent thyroid Study in Japan

Q1. Why did he ignore the age profile of tumour sufferers? If the
headline rate of tumours were caused by radiation, then it should be
the very youngest in the screening programme with tumours. Yet the
Fukushima group tumours are concentrated in the highest age group.

A1. Our paper was based on the data within 3 years after the accident
(2011-2014). In Chernobyl, age distribution of thyroid cancer cases
within 3 years after the accident (1986-1989) was also mainly
teenagers (see the below pasted table). You can obtain same data in
the URL (http://www.aec.go.jp/jicst/NC/tyoki/bunka5/siryo5/siryo42.htm),
which was written in Japanese, but its figures can be read by
non-Japanese. The table was created by Professor Shunichi Yamashita
(Nagasaki University) using cancer registry in Gomel Voblast in
Belarus. Its columes express from 0 to 17 indicate “age in the
accident”. And, its rows express from 1985 to 1998 indicate “year at
diagnosis of thyroid cancer”. You can find 10 thyroid cancer cases
among 13 within 3 years after the accident (1986-1989) were 10 years
old and higher age at diagnosis. This age distribution is quite
similar to the finding in Fukushima within 3 years after the accident
(2011-2014). Furthermore, during 1986-1989 in Chernobyl, any screening
program was not conducted at all. Therefore, some thyroid cancer
induced by the accident would be detected within one yeas after the
accident by screening program in Fukushima.

Q2. When he did his internal comparison, why did he exclude west
Fukushima? If West Fukushima is included, the relationship between
distance from the plant and rate of tumours seems to disappear.

A2. As everyone knows, most of Fukushima Prefecture was contaminated
after March 11, 2011. Since afternoon on March 14, especially, larger
and wider contamination occurred. Western least contaminated district
was also contaminated especially Aizu-Wakamatsu City and its
neighboring towns. These city and towns have highest population
density in the district. In other words, the most of population in the
district were included in the city and the towns although the district
has very wide area. Radioactive plume from the power plant flowed to
the city and the towns through the Koriyama City district. But,
southeastern district may be relatively avoided by the radioactive
plume, which indicated in the below figure. A volcano expert,
Professor Hayakawa (Gunma University) made the figure. You can obtain
the figure in the URL
(http://blog-imgs-51-origin.fc2.com/k/i/p/kipuka/0810B.jpg ).


Q3. Why did he assume a very low latency period for thyroid cancer?
His paper assumes a latency period of 4 years, but the literature
shows a latency period of between four and thirty years. A longer
latency period means a much bigger screening effect. (And evidence
from Korea indicates it can be a very large effect).

A3. First, we should share findings on excess thyroid cancer cases
around Chernobyl between 1987 and 1989. In both Belarus and Ukraine,
statistically significant excesses of thyroid cancer cases were
observed as indicated in references 28 and 29 in our paper. 28. Malko
MV. 19. Chernobyl radiation-induced thyroid cancers in Belarus. In:
Imanaka T, ed. Recent Research Activities about the Chernobyl NPP
Accident in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia; 2002, pp. 240–55. Available
at: http://www.rri.kyoto-u.ac.jp/NSRG/reports/kr79/kr79pdf/kr79.pdf .
Accessed March 29, 2015. 29. Ministry of Ukraine of Emergencies and
Affairs of population protection from the consequences of Chornobyl
Catastrophe and All Ukrainian Research Institute of Population and
Territories Civil Defense from Technogenic and Natural Emergencies. 5.
Medical aspects. 20 years after Chernobyl catastrophe future outlook
-National report of Ukraine-. K.: Atika, Kyiv; 2006, pp. 68–88.
Available at: http://chernobyl.undp.org/russian/docs/ukr_report_2006.pdf
. Accessed March 29, 2015. You wrote, “The literature shows a latency
period of between four and thirty years”. But, minimum latency of
childhood thyroid cancer is shorter than four years as indicated by
the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and as observed in
Chernobyl between 1987 and 1989 (ref. 28 and 29).

Second, we assigned 4 years as latent duration (latency: mean years
duration), but actual mean latency since the accident among subjects
was about 2 years. On the other hand, possible latency among them may
be about 20 years. When assigning 1 year to several ten years as a
sensitivity analysis, anyone can notice that significant excess of
thyroid cancer cases in Fukushima Prefecture except the northeastern
district does not change. Third, what report do you want to indicate
as “Evidence from Korea”? Is it the article by Ahn et al. in New
England Journal of Medicine in 2014? If so, the finding is among
adults who received cancer screenings, not for childhood or
adolescents. Furthermore, as the article wrote, “Despite guidelines
recommending against evaluation and surgery for tumors less than 0.5
cm in diameter, one quarter of surgical patients now have tumors that
fall into this category”, its diagnostic criteria of thyroid screening
was quite different from that of the Fukushima screening program. Ahn
HS, Kim HJ and Welch HG: Korea’s thyroid-cancer “Epidemic” – Screening
and overdiagnosis. N Engl J Med 2014; 371: 1765-1767.

Q4. Why did he ignore the evidence from analyses of tumours that show
no signs of the markers of radiogenic thyroid cancer, and most show
the markers of regular adult thyroid cancer?

A4. What kinds of markers did you indicate? Even if such marker may be
useful to detect “radiogenic thyroid cancer”, when the high relative
risks indicated in our paper were observed, I think that the result
and the conclusion would not so change.

Q5. Why does he think Gerry Thomas, the head of the Chernobyl Tissue
Bank, described his study as "not a good study to base opinions on"?

A5. I do not know Dr Gerry Thomas. May be, he is not an epidemiologist
because he is a head of the Tissue Bank. If he is not an
epidemiologist, he cannot validly evaluate an epidemiological study
written by us.

[EDITORS NOTE; Prof. G Thomas did not contact  Prof Toshihide Tsude

but made her claim that she cast doubt on the study? [Sam McGill said
on JT comments (link below)  "...In any case, Gerry Thomas - who
doesn't work for the SMC - isn't a nuclear engineer anyway. She
focuses on health and radiation. So you've got that criticism wrong
too. And it's not just Gerry Thomas who's cast doubt on Tsuda's
study.....]]

Q6. How far does he see his work as contradicting current mainstream
scientific opinion on the relationship between dose and response in
radiogenic thyroid cancer?

A6. We do not think that our results contradict current mainstream
scientific opinion on the relationship between dose and response in
radiogenic thyroid cancer. Why do you think so? The result indicates
the radiation burden to thyroid organ of children and adolescents in
Fukushima after March 2011.

Original Sources and correspondents below;

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arclight2011part2 | November 22, 2015 at 11:21 am | URL: http://wp.me/phgse-l9x


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