RE: Chernobyl thyroid doses ?

[Franta, Jaroslav]

This article (below) includes some interesting comments on the subject....

please see section highlighted in red, near the end.



Jaro  

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Nucleonics Week

Volume 25 / Number 28 / July 10, 2003

French Academy of Medicine backs nuclear option as best for health

The nuclear option should be maintained because nuclear is the electricity

source with the least public health impact, according to France's National

Academy of Medicine. 

In an opinion issued July 1, the academy (http://www.academie-medecine.fr)

said that nuclear has a smaller health impact per kilowatt-hour than

technologies for fossil fuel com-bustion,

biomass or waste incineration, because of the atmospheric pollution

they create. Even wind and photovoltaic power free pollutants during the

life

cycle of equipment they use, the academy noted, citing the European Union's

1996-2001 ExternE external-costs study.

The doctors reiterated an earlier opinion that estimating health effects

for low doses of radiation-below a few milliSieverts-based on the linear

non-threshold

(LNT) theory of radiation dose effects "is not scientifically justified."

The same is true, they added, for low concentrations of carcinogenic

products other than radiotoxins.

<SNIP>

The opinion followed a seminar late last month, sponsored by the academy

during France's ongoing national energy policy debate, on "Energy Options

and Health." 

The academy represents a broad spectrum of medical professions.

<SNIP>

Andre Aurengo, a thyroid cancer specialist at the Pitie-Salpetriere

Hospital and organizer of the seminar, acknowledged

it was "scientifically impossible to prove that a risk

does not exist." But he said that the limits of epidemiology

at low doses and the fact that "numerous studies" contradict

the LNT hypothesis indicate that hypothesis "should not be

considered as a scientific given, but as a tool adapted to the

needs of regulation."

Aurengo, who is currently leading a government-com-missioned

study of Chernobyl fallout effects in France and a

possible link with an increase in thyroid cancers, said French

doctors are in general poorly informed about radiation effects.

<SNIP>

More than 55% of those surveyed thought the increase

in thyroid cancers in France was due to Chernobyl fallout,

and the same percentage thought that increase was noted in

adults as well as children. In fact, Aurengo said, the increase

in thyroid cancer began in 1975, well before the 1986

Ukrainian reactor accident, and didn't accelerate after 1986.

Moreover, the characteristics of the French cancers bear little

resemblance to those seen in the regions closest to

Chernobyl, where the disease affected mainly children and

adolescents and led to chromosome rearrangement. 

Aurengo said more effort should be made to inform non-specialized

physicians in radiological and other risks.

<SNIP>

.-Ann MacLachlan, Paris