Many people in Japan think that low level exposure to radioactivity in hot springs is good for you. That includes many scientists. Hideo Ikegami thought so. There may be something to it.
We are evolved to survive low, natural levels, so I doubt they cause much harm. Jones Beene <[email protected]> wrote: > Yet - long term study of the survivors of the atom bombing of Hiroshima and > Nagasaki have indicated the exposure after a bomb can cause a slight excess > in cancer rates in the exposed individuals who survived the blast, but it > is > surprisingly small. Survived the blast for how long? Thousands of people died in the months following the blast. Some died from ordinary wounds but many others from the effects of radiation. Various different effects, such as anemia. The radiation caused many diseases other than cancer. I know some survivors who have a lifetime of ill-health and weakness, although not cancer yet. Assume that "long term" means living more than 20 years after the blast. I expect that group of people were either not exposed much, or they happened to be extraordinarily healthy and resistant to the anemia and other effects. In other words, weak people were killed off in the first year. Although the survivors have been intensely studied, I have some doubts about this epidemiology. The results are tainted by politics on both sides. Some what to emphasize the long term health damage; others want to downplay it. Also, I think the group might be too small. Even with hundreds of thousands of members it may not be large enough to detect statistically significant variations of some forms of cancer. - Jed
