D'coda Dcoda
Researcher,writer,knowledge management, curator, wilderness skills, permaculture,herbalism,health,alternative economics,transformation
D'coda Dcoda
Researcher,writer,knowledge management, curator, wilderness skills, permaculture,herbalism,health,alternative economics,transformation
Diigo won't highlight on pdf's, this one is important and concerns current levels of radiation allowed in foodstuffs...a press release:
Berlin, 20 September 2011. Current radiation value limits for contaminated foodstuffs in the
European Union and in Japan do not offer enough health protection since they permit the
population to be unnecessarily exposed to high health risks. This is the conclusion reached in
the report, Calculated Fatalities From Radiation: Officially Permissible Limits for Radioactively
Contaminated Food in the European Union and Japan, released in Berlin today by the
consumer advocacy organization foodwatch and the German Section of the International
Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). The report is based on a study by
Thomas Dersee und Sebastian Pflugbeil (German Society for Radiation Protection).
Foodwatch and IPPNW believe that the European Union, the German government and
the Japanese government do not do enough to inform their citizens that there are no 'safe'
maximum limits for the radioactive contamination of foodstuffs. Exposure to radiation, no
matter how minimal, is a risk to health because it is enough to trigger major illnesses such as
cancer. The setting of any permissible limits is equivalent to making a decision on the number
of fatalities to be tolerated. According to calculation models used by the International
Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP), the European Union today accepts that current
permissible value limits will lead to at least roughly 150,000 additional cancer deaths in
Germany alone each year as a consequence of radiation exposure from food - under the
theoretical assumption that the population has a dietary intake only of products contaminated
to the maximum permissible limit. The consumption of food containing only 5 percent of
permitted levels of contamination still means that at least 7,700 additional fatalities each year
are tolerated in Germany. Please note: foodwatch and the German Section of IPPNW have no
information that highly contaminated foodstuffs from Japan currently are in the market in
Europe.
Permissible limits today in the EU stand between 200 and 600 becquerels of cesium per
kilogram of food. This is in stark contradiction to standards found in currently valid German
legislation. The German Radiation Protection Ordinance governing the operation of nuclear
power plants stipulates that total exposure for an individual may not exceed an effective annual
dose of 1 mSv per year. In contrast, the EU radiation limits for foodstuffs tolerate an annual
dose of at least 33 mSv for adults and 68 mSv for children and adolescents. In Belarus and
Ukraine, countries severely affected by the Chernobyl disaster, permissible limits are much
stricter than in the European Union - which means that foodstuffs which can no longer be
marketed there because of their level of contamination can be legally sold in the EU.
Since there is enough food available which is far less radioactively contaminated, there is
no need to expect people to eat highly contaminated products. For this reason, foodwatch and
IPPNW are calling for a drastic lowering of the value limits from their present level of 370
becquerels (200 for imports from Japan) down to 8 becquerels of cesium per kilogram for
baby food and milk products, and from the present level of 600 becquerels (currently 500 for
imports from Japan) down to 16 becquerels of cesium per kilogram for all other foodstuffs.
see the pdf for more info
related docs can be found on the recent link to "Symposium Documents" in Energy