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Re: Article - While scientists call it a killer, health-seekers bathein the glow of radon
This may sound like a silly question, but has anyone
ever determined how much dose people who visit a radon
bath receive? The risk is associated with the dose,
not the number of times one goes to get a "treatment."
--- Susan Gawarecki <loc@icx.net> wrote:
> While scientists call it a killer, health-seekers
> bathe in the glow of
> radon (Atlanta Journal Constitution/Associated
> Press, Nov. 4. 2004)
>
> OFUNA, Japan . It has been singled out as the
> second-leading cause of
> lung cancer in the United States, right behind
> smoking. But to Shiro
> Umeda, sprightly at 74, radon is the best thing
> since aspirin.
>
> Every month for the past 10 years, he has come to a
> radon bath here to
> soak it up and breathe it in. He's convinced it has
> helped ease his back
> pain and improve his overall health.
>
> Undaunted by warnings from the scientific community
> that the highly
> radioactive gas is a carcinogen, tens of thousands
> of health-seekers
> like Umeda are drawn each year to hot springs in
> Japan that claim radon
> can cure an array of ills.
>
> "Not a doubt in my mind," Umeda said after a recent
> session. "It makes
> me feel better."
>
> The popularity of radon is nothing new.
>
> At the turn of the century, its curative powers were
> believed to be so
> strong that products containing radon or radium, its
> parent element,
> ranged from toothpaste and beauty creams to
> chocolate bars.
>
> Research has since led most health experts to make
> an about-face.
>
> Most, but not all.
>
> While acknowledging that high doses are undoubtedly
> dangerous, Yutaka
> Okumura, a professor of radiology at Nagasaki
> University, a leading
> center of radiation research, said the issue may be
> less simple than
> some of the more dire cautions suggest.
>
> Okumura cited a study he participated in that found
> cancer fatalities
> between 1976 and 1993 among more than 4,300 people
> living near one of
> Japan's most famous radon springs, Misasa, were
> significantly lower than
> rates elsewhere. Radon levels in the test area were
> roughly 70
> becquerels per cubic meter, or about three times
> higher than those in
> the control areas.
>
> "I believe people who frequent radon hot springs may
> be less likely to
> die of cancer," he said.
>
> However, Nagasaki University professor Shunichi
> Yamashita, a colleague
> of Okumura's who specializes in the effects of
> radiation on atomic-bomb
> victims, said many radon hot springs are safe simply
> because, unlike
> Misasa, they don't actually have much radon.
>
> "Japanese radon baths use so little radon, almost
> nonmeasurable or close
> to zero, that there should be no worries at all," he
> said.
>
> Other than Okumura's cancer study, there is also
> little evidence linking
> radon to any specific health benefits. Claims like
> radon-believer
> Umeda's are often explained by researchers as the
> result of the placebo
> effect, or to the soothing heat of the bathwater
> itself.
>
> That the gas can be deadly is not a question.
>
> Radon, produced by the decay of radium, is
> classified as a carcinogen by
> the World Health Organization. The U.S.
> Environmental Protection Agency
> estimates radon in indoor air causes about 21,000
> deaths each year in
> the United States alone, and is the leading cause of
> lung cancer after
> smoking.
>
> Its first known victim was Marie Curie, who won her
> second Nobel Prize
> in 1911 for discovering radium and another
> radioactive element. She
> eventually developed chronic radiation sickness from
> her daily contact
> with radon and radium and died of leukemia.
>
> The gas normally enters the body through inhalation.
> Most is exhaled
> right back out again, but some can accumulate in the
> lungs, where its
> radioactive decay can harm the tissue around it and
> lead to cancer.
>
> Such warnings are nowhere to be found at this
> popular indoor radon bath
> on Tokyo's southern outskirts. Signs instead claim
> radon can tame
> everything from high blood pressure to hemorrhoids.
>
> "Alpha waves emitted by the gas are brought into the
> body when you
> breathe," one sign says. "They go to every corner of
> your capillaries.
> ... This active metabolization brought about by
> radon is the cause of
> its refreshing and rehabilitating powers."
>
> Pamphlets for the center add that its "health rooms"
> are "pumped full of
> radon from six large-scale radon-producing
> machines." The bath's manager
> refused to comment on the specifics, but said the
> machines used are set
> to "safe levels."
>
> Whether that's even possible is a matter of debate.
>
> "There is no safe level of radon . any exposure
> poses some risk of
> cancer," the EPA says on its Radon Information Web
> site.
>
> The Japanese government, meanwhile, has taken a very
> different stance.
>
> "For now, we don't see the need to regulate radon,"
> said Ryosuke
> Murayama, of the science agency's nuclear regulation
> office. "Radon that
> exists in the air is minimal, and thus poses little
> health danger."
>
>
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=====
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-- John
John Jacobus, MS
Certified Health Physicist
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