No Rise In Cancer Seen From Japan's Fukushima Nuclear Disaster, UN Says

[wtmusic]

"VIENNA, May 31 (Reuters) - The evacuation of tens of thousands of people helped prevent rising cancer rates and other health problems after Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster, the world's worst in 25 years, U.N. scientists said on Friday.

Radiation exposure following the reactor meltdowns more than two years ago did not cause any immediate health effects, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) said after its annual meeting.

That would be in contrast to Chernobyl, the 1986 Soviet reactor explosion which sent radioactive dust across much of Europe and is believed to have caused thyroid cancer in some children."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/31/japan-fukushima-cancer-rates-nuclear-disaster_n_3366073.html

[madokie]

1. See what the Japanese people have to say about this

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/351473#ixzz2VDQgzDf4

Seems they don't want the nuke plants to come back on line. Possibly feel they've been duped into believing the nuclear hype that the nuke plants are safe. Personally I wouldn't hold my breath until they turn these nuclear power plants back on as I think it will be a long long time before that happens

[FBaggins]

3. That's *some* of the Japanese people

Somehow... they don't oppose the move in large enough numbers to put a big dent in the government's ~70% popularity.

Even though the government has made it clear that they intend to restart most of the plants and even resume construction on new ones.

[madokie]

4. We'll see about that

[Nihil]

6. You're not disagreeing with the OP

>> The evacuation of tens of thousands of people helped prevent rising cancer rates and other health problems

> Seems they don't want the nuke plants to come back on line.

The fact that the UN has pointed out that the major health issues from Chernobyl were avoided in Fukushima
by an effective & timely large scale evacuation does not conflict with the (completely reasonable) distrust of
the nuclear industry by a large part of the Japanese public.



The OP article doesn't say "... and so the reactors should all be turned back on immediately" or anything of
the sort. Neither does it say that any future potential deaths from radiation magically outweigh the 19,000 actual
deaths from the earthquake & tsunami and so must be used as justification for keeping the reactors closed
down forever. Those sort of comments are left to the media and internet forum posters.

This report is a simple factual expression of the successful handling of a large scale potential disaster
(in the midst of a far larger scale ongoing disaster) that prevented & avoided the horrendous outcomes
from the 1986 nightmare.

What's not to celebrate in that?

(Unless your name is Arnold Gundersen in which case your hype & lies have been proven false yet again )

[diane in sf]

2. 'Yet' would be the operative word here

[wtmusic]

5. They didn't use that word.

Weiss, who chairs work on UNSCEAR's Fukushima report, told reporters that dose levels were "so low that we don't expect to see any increase in cancer in the future in the population".

That means that based on a lot of data that was considered health effects have been negligible and will likely continue to be negligible.