SCI/TECH: Scientists Say No Level Of Radiation "Safe"

it was like 7 months ago his mom was driving us through the north east neigborhood... (they have gangs there in portland oregon) and there was a gang fight or something.... he got shot....his mom was arguing with the doctor cuz he didnt cover anything up when they were taking the x-rays be4 removing the bullet

Originally posted by russiankid
it was like 7 months ago his mom was driving us through the north east neigborhood... (they have gangs there in portland oregon) and there was a gang fight or something.... he got shot....his mom was arguing with the doctor cuz he didnt cover anything up when they were taking the x-rays be4 removing the bullet

Hmm. Genocide by sterility? ...Was he black? Poor? Otherwise challenged?

nope he was white(what does that have to do with anything???)... he was able to have kids and he wasnt poor his mom works with my mom they are anesthesiologists they make... 3.5 thousand a month after tax...

That's really weird then because they are SUPPOSED to use a lead shield when they are taking x-rays. No matter where I've had an x-ray done, they've used a lead shield with me.

Tres weird. Maybe RK was stoned and didn't notice. The story just doesn't hang together. Especially the part about the anesthesiologist mom who just let it slide. Wouldn't happen. Also, this kid got zapped, then went right out and had kids? To prove he wasn't sterilized by the experience? ...I'm missing something here...

had kids??? never said that i said that he can and they pushed the mom away from the surgury room it was some other hospital not the 1 she worked in (shw works at OHSU and we were at a diferent hospital my ex gf is there cuz she has this stupid desieas thing)

Well, even if any amount of radiation is bad for me, its not like I can actually escape it, since apart from medical things some stuff that we have in our own house produce it in small amounts.

Originally posted by HowardRoark
You realize, of course that, historically, the world was more radioactive in the past, then it is now, don't you?

I don't know why, but this statement made me laugh out loud.

Anyways, back to the main point...does this mean that we all have to live in lead boxes form now on. Doesn't sound like much fun.

Can't do that either. We'll all die of lead poisoning.

This reminds me of the joke "Scientists release study showing that studies are dangerous."

Originally posted by Zaphod58
Can't do that either. We'll all die of lead poisoning.

Zut Alors! Never thought of that. Can I live in a graphite suit then?

Try living underwater. But I'm sure there will be a study soon to show how dangerous that will be.

DANGER, Will Robinson, DANGER!!!!!!!

www.nrc.gov...

Man-made radiation sources that result in an exposure to members of the public are

* Tobacco
* Televisions
* Medical x-rays
* Smoke detectors
* Lantern mantles
* Nuclear medicine
* Building materials

By far, the most significant source of man-made radiation exposure to the public is from medical procedures, such as diagnostic x-rays, nuclear medicine, and radiation therapy. Some of the major isotopes are I-131, Tc-99m, Co-60, Ir-192, and Cs-137.

In addition, members of the public are exposed to radiation from consumer products, such as tobacco (polonium-210), building materials, combustible fuels (gas, coal, etc.), ophthalmic glass, televisions, luminous watches and dials (tritium), airport x-ray systems, smoke detectors (americium), road construction materials, electron tubes, fluorescent lamp starters, lantern mantles (thorium), etc.

Butt out that smoke and "STAND AWAY FROM YOUR COMPUTER"
DO NOT go out in the sun, and give up modern medicine............

The fact of the matter is that humans live longer life spans than ever before.

My dad had cancer, mainly from playing with mercury while he was little, they didn't know the effects of it back in the 40's and 50's.

He nearly died, it was a miracle he lived, most of it is thanks to modern chemotherapie and some alternative treatment administered by my mom, my dad had testicular cancer and never had a relapse since, however he did get diabetes and Aphendisitis which he nearly died of.

fortunatly I still have my dad and all that is thanks to modern medicine and some alternative treatment.

Also, I'd like to add that Cellphone use, Toothpaste, Milk, Redmeat etc didn't give me cancer yet, alot of these claims that certain products cause cancer seem to be BS.

What exactly propted this line of thinking??? There are many people who have received radiation for cancer, and later have it resurface.....MUCH more often then you might think. The people who truly beat cancer do so through lifestyle alteration. Everyone has the ability to develop cancer, it takes the right stimuli to trigger it; e.g. stress, environmental toxins, ect. My father died from cancer years ago after it going into remission and then returning again...

Flawed logic.

Sure, people have recurrences - and most are due to the original cancer not being eradicated adequately to begin with, not the result of radiation therapy. Though we try hard, there's just no guarantee that your cancer is completely, utterly gone once and for all - even removing the organ can leave residual tissue and/or cellular matter, which will carry the same risk factors (case in point: removal of the ovaries will not guarantee that you will never develop ovarian cancer; likewise, double mastectomy will not promise that you'll be free from breast-cancer).

When cancer does occur as a result of therapy, it tends to be the leukaemias; outside of this, it's unusual (though not unheard of) to find two different, non-linked cancers in the same patient (nor at the same time). Bear in mind that a malignant tumour in the liver can be secondary to a primary tumour elsewhere; this isn't "two difference cancers".

There are literally tens of thousands of cancer patients who "truly beat" cancer through various medical treatments (chemotherapy, radiotherapy etc); lifestyle alteration might indeed help a great deal with some cancers, but they won't help for every patient.

Is there anyone here worrying about x-rays who actually looked at that report"

The BEIR VII report defines low doses as those in the range of near zero up to about 100 mSv (0.1 Sv) of low-LET radiation. People in the United States are exposed to average annual background radiation levels of about 3 mSv; exposure from a chest X-ray is about 0.1 mSv; and exposure from a whole body computerized tomography (CT) scan is about 10 mSv.

Do the math, people! You get ionizing radiation equal to thirty x-rays per year just by walking around; and even radiation equal to a thousand x-rays a year is considered "low doses" from a health standpoint anyway!

And if you live in a place like Denver or Flagstaff you're going to get additional radiation equal to about thirty more cat scans a year; and if you live in places like Punto Arenas, Argentina or Puerto Williams, Chile, you'll get a hundred times that much!

If you're not interested enough to actually read the report that you're discussing, at least read someone who have thought this thing through, like tinkleflower or zaphod.

Well about the people working with x-ray equipment........... You know they wear a badge that measures the rads they are exposed to right. An x-ray tech is only allowed to recieve a certain level of rads during thier entire career, they have to keep logs detailing this.

Besides, put 5 people in a room, expose them all to an equal amount of radiation, now guess who will get cancer. It could be all 5, might be just one or even none of them, the point is no one knows who will get cancer from exactly how much ionizing radiation. That was the point of the article.

You can't say look at Denver, they have high radiation levels and not everyone has cancer. That is a flawed argument. It may be that some people are easily affected while others are not. Besides no none knows what the long term affect on human genes are from increased radiation levels. There are other concerns besides cancer that were'nt even mentioned in the article like birth defects.

I'm not sure why this is "news". This has been understood to be the case for quite some time. Maybe is is just that the "official version" is catching up.

Several years ago, I worked in the Heath Physics department at a nuclear power station. I have to qualify this by saying that I am a Software Engineer, not a Heath Physicist. However, everyone in the plant underwent some degree of training in Health Physics, and moreso in the Health Physics department.

We were taught that, as the paper states, there are seperate effects from high-level and low-level exposure. The high-level exposure results in the effects the public may more commonly associate with radiation exposure - from nausea to rather rapid death. Low-level exposure can cause cellular changes. There is a probability, based on dose, that the cellular changes brought about by low-level exposure may result in a cancer. Although the precise mechanism is not known, it is believed (or at least was at the time) that it has to do with just which cell and where within the cell it is struck by the subatomic particle.

You can see, then, that it is an entirely random process. There is some probability (but very small) that exposure to only a single subatomic particle could result in a cancer. There is also a probability (also very small) that you could be exposed to a very high level of radiation, and NOT develop cancer. (Although the high-level effects, which are NOT probabalistic, would do you in first.)

Based on this understanding, our guiding philosophy, then, was to always reduce exposure further whenever practical - even when below various limits. (Generating station personnel have monthly, quarterly, yearly exposure limits.) We tracked exposure for every person in the plant, and strove to reduce it both for individuals and for the plant population as a whole. There was no "good enough" level of reduction - that was drilled into us.

(If you are wondering - how do you reduce exposure? By a variety of means, as simple as evening of doses through work assignments, or as complicated as building mock-ups of work areas where work assignments can be practiced so as to reduce exposure time, and the building of specialized tools and shielding for even a single one-time task.)



[edit on 30-6-2005 by Bay_Watcher]

.... yea everybody knew that no lever ov radiation is safe

Medical radiation is a big issue and getting bigger. Cardiovascular diseases are the #1 killer in the USA - and involve lesions that can spread throughout the vascular system. Procedures like angiograms, angioplasties, and stenting once were used mainly for the heart - but now are being used more and more often in other sites. ...Radiation exposure from these procedures has been compared to being in the fallout region at Hiroshima - and periodically, the issue hits the news when patients set off radiation alarms in airports, train stations or other facilities with radiation detection systems.

.Incidence rates for cancer have been increasing parallel with the -rapidly- increasing use of radiation-based medical technologies. ...And cancer is about to become the #1 killer in America.

Some Background:

News, Reviews, and Articles on Brachytherapy (brachytherapy is the palacement of radiation eluting supports called "stents" in the arteries)
www.findhealthnews.com...

Radiation Exposure in Invasive Cardiology
www.wma.net...

Radiation injuries
www.healthatoz.com...

"Malpractice Issues in Radiology: Radiation-Induced Skin Injuries and Fluoroscopy." AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2001 Jul;177(1):21-5. Radiation-induced skin injuries and fluoroscopy. Berlin L. Department of Radiology, Rush North Shore Medical Center, 9600 Gross Point Rd., Skokie, IL 60076, USA. PMID: 11418391

Real-time quantification and display of skin radiation during coronary angiography and intervention.
circ.ahajournals.org...



Cardiologists sometimes ignore radiation risks in heart procedure
www.keepmedia.com...



X-Ray Visionary: John Gofman and the Patients’ Right-to-Know Project
www.bcaction.org...

Fatal Fallout
www.garynull.com...




For a quick overview - run a google search for +angioplasty OR arteriography OR angiogram +Hiroshima +radiation.

For more info - just drop Hiroshima.


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I suppose then, one has to ask oneself...

Is the procedure more harmful than the condition?

With cardiology particularly, the answer would generally be "no, not as a rule".

There will always be a risk with virtually any medical procedure; it seems to be more a question of assessing the need for the procedure versus possibly risks therein.