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RE: Not using LNT to calculate risk does not mean there is no risk.
Barbara:
I think you're on a
wrong, or at least non-productive, track. The fact is, that LDR does NOT
produce an additional risk. Most evidence indicates that it reduces the
risk of cancer and of shorter longevity. That's what the data say. I
don't have any data on reindeer tramplings, but I do have data on LDR.
Even NCRP-136, the latest proclamation on LNT, states on page 6, and in the news
release on it issuance, that most populations exposed to LDR do not show
increased cancer and most show decreased cancer. That's right in the
report.
The fact that they
then recommend using LNT anyway is another issue. But they do not claim
that the data show an increased risk from LDR. We must keep clear on that
point.
Ted
Rockwell
In a message dated 12/23/2002 8:10:45 PM Pacific
Standard Time, jrcamero@facstaff.wisc.edu writes:
My draft letter
points out that neither the HPS nor the ICRP
have stated that there
is no risk from low doses.
I agree, but we must keep in mind there is risk from every
conceivable human activity. What scientist in their right mind would ever
say there is "no risk" from something? I don't think that's legitimate
under any circumstances. There is a "risk" that a reindeer will trample me
to death on Christmas Eve. It may be vanishingly small, but there IS a
risk.
I recently had an elected official say to me, "If you would just
"prove" to the community this is absolutely safe, then there wouldn't be a
problem," or something to that effect. How does one respond? You
CAN'T "prove" that anything is absolutely safe. You can drown in milk,
accidentally slit your wrist with a nail file, suffocate on the smoke from the
chestnuts roasting by your open fire by forgetting to open the chimney
flue. NOTHING is "absolutely safe." It is silly to think in those
terms. Yet, where "exotic" harms are involved, such as the public
perceives radioactive materials to be, they expect some impermeable warranty on
the safety.
How do we educate people on the realities of risk?
That's the real question in my opinion.
Barbara