Re: Natural background.

[JMUCKERHEIDE@delphi.com]

George Anastas writes:

>I think the Health Physics profession and the Health Physics Society has a
>LOT of educating to do with not only science teachers but our elected
>officials as well.

Amen; except I would say "our elected officials even more so". But, they are
largely uneducable. They pride themselves on technical illiteracy (and
pronounce on how "you people" need to learn how to talk to the general
public, and only want to know what has sexy political rhetoric (on either
side). Political talk is, by definition, competing lies: who can sway the
voters/media with their bumpersticker slogans and rhetoric. It is the
antithesis for the search for fact and truth, the basis for technical
discussion and debate. The anti's learned this in the '70s: Nader grabbed
the Union of Concerned Scientists as said, "you've got to stop this
technical stuff and put the political spin on your message that will grab
the media and the public if you want to succeed" (success measured by column
inches and fund raising; all the true engineers and scientists left that
worked on the Emergency Core Cooling System issue, and UCS went on to great
political success - until its malfeasance was finally exposed by the Gov of
PA after TMI on the issue of UCS's horror stories about Kr-85 release from
the TMI containment.)

>How 'bout a pack of information we can use to brief legislators and their 
>assistants.  Background radiation (including my favorite snack, Brazil
>nuts), medical radiation

Very good!

>and the steps taken to eliminate unnecessary exposure.

Very bad!

We always get to this, and very quickly in the public message. The "success"
in "eliminating unnecessary exposure" always means that any exposure is bad.
Our "heroic" effort to prevent exposure would not be justified unless that
exposure were VERY hazardous. (After all, we don't spend a fraction of the
resources protecting ourselves from many other real hazardous that are
really debilitating and deadly. The message is to reinforce the perception
that you are trying to address.) We just went through such an exercise on
LLW, and the public was outraged that we would put solid materials in
engineered facilities that would have < 1 mrem/yr to the hypothetical
maximum exposed individual, and a 25 mrem reg limit. Witness BRC at < 1
mrem/yr! If you want to carry a message, talk about radiation, natural
radioactivity, and variations that result in no health effects; and that
even the linear model projects "negligible" consequences (per Warren
Sinclair as discussed here previously) which does not justify public
health concern and significant resources below some significant exposure;
and that the linear model is not supported by the scientific evidence (of
say, 4-5 million people in the US, with I-131 procedures - say 10 rem WB,
50 rem thyroid, studies show no adverse health effects; of the radium
ingestion population, no carcinomas or sarcomas below 1000 RAD - Q=20?,
20,000 rem?; many people living today with >50,000 _RAD_! Government decided
to stop reporting/taking data!

>Then I think a perspective on what other nations are doing

More of the same, except UNSCEAR (and other nations) are beginning to
document the data on the cell repair response (see UNSCEAR 1/94 document).

>as well as
>a comparison with chemical exposures (NCRP 96, Comparative
>Carcinogenicity of Ionizing Radiation and Chemicals)  would be appropriate.

The argument that radiation is ok because something else is worse doesn't
have much positive public response. (And NCRP 96 seems more oriented to
trying to apply the "wonders" of radiation protection philosophy and the
false process of assessing "carcinogenicity" for radiation to chemicals than
deal with comparisons of carcinogenicity between chemicals and radiation.

>We have a great story to tell, why not place it in terms that a legislator
>can understand, and then tell it in unambiguous and clear terms.

I agree. But it needs to focus on radiation effects data, not how much we
can spend to reduce radiation exposure.

>I can't (yes I can) believe that a legislator doesn't know that there
>is a concept called "background".

Well, if the Indiana legislature really passed legislation to make the value
of pi=3...

On the other hand, the other guy making the point could have simply referred
to radon. That's been enough of an issue in Congress, with EPAs bureaucratic
exercise to obtain $10s of millions to chase radon with no possible public
health benefit, and issuing unjustified radon warnings for bureaucratic
excess that will cost $Billions, and continuing to reinforce the perception
that any radiation must be reduced at any cost. And how are we going to go
to the public without taking that on directly?

>By the way, I dislike, with a passion, the "new units".  Other than the
>names of the people, they don't make sense.  Why not just substitute the
>names for the rem and rad, keep the bq, but also keep the Ci.

Agree again, though they "make sense" when you accept that the system tries
to avoid units that are not based on physical properties to the base 10! :)
37 billion as a base becomes difficult! I appreciate all who use cGy! :)

>My 372 pesos, 92 yen, 4 drachma and $.02.

And my penny's worth.

>George Anastas, M.P.H., P.E., C.H.P.

Jim Muckerheide            |       JMuckerheide@Delphi.com