You are not being logical on this one. Radiation at *any* level disrupts the DNA in living cells. Don't you realise that the "approved" radiation you instance below is precisely because of this powerfully damaging effect?
At 12:35 01/06/2003 -0700, you wrote:
Irradiation is approved by a slew of scientific and food organizations including the Food and Drug Administration, the World Health Organization and the American Medical Association.
Radiation is applied to food in order to kill the living DNA of harmful bacteria. Two years ago, radiation was applied to my prostate gland in order to kill cancer cells. It also killed non-cancer cells but, hopefully, more cancer cells than living cells. (The principle of the treatment is that because cancer cells have a higher metabolism than normal cells, the cancerous DNA is more likely to be dividing and thus even more vulnerable to radiation than usual.)
Yes, all life forms have evolved to cope with low level background radiation from the earth and from outer space by means of spending much energy on enzymes which repair our DNA which is being constantly disrupted. Thus our bodies are kept in decent condition long enough to grow old enough to procreate. But this doesn't make low level radiation healthy. Homo sapiens evolved with enough skills to cope with attacks from tigers and so forth. This doesn't make tigers healthy at close quarters!
Keith Hudson
Keith Hudson, 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath, England
