Radiation-induced cancer
Non-ionizing radio frequency radiation from mobile phones, electric power transmission, and other similar sources have been investigated as a possible carcinogen by the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer, but to date, no evidence of this has been observed.
Typical contributors to such risk include natural background radiation, medical procedures, occupational exposures, nuclear accidents, and many others.
[6] Radiation is a more potent source of cancer when it is combined with other cancer-causing agents, such as radon gas exposure plus smoking tobacco.
[9] Other nuclear medicine techniques involve the injection of radioactive pharmaceuticals directly into the bloodstream, and radiotherapy treatments deliberately deliver lethal doses (on a cellular level) to tumors and surrounding tissues.
[10][11] This estimate is criticized by the American College of Radiology (ACR), which maintains that the life expectancy of CT scanned patients is not that of the general population and that the model of calculating cancer is based on total-body radiation exposure and thus faulty.
In March 2011, an earthquake and tsunami caused damage that led to explosions and partial meltdowns at the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant in Japan.
On March 24, 2011, Japanese officials announced that "radioactive iodine-131 exceeding safety limits for infants had been detected at 18 water-purification plants in Tokyo and five other prefectures".
The two's supervisor, Yutaka Yokokawa, who was sitting in a desk far from the tank where the uranium hexafluoride was being poured into, was dosed with 3 sieverts and survived, but was charged with negligence in October 2000.
[18] In 2020, Zrielykh reported a high and statistically significant incidence of pancreatic cancer in Ukraine for a period of 10 year, there have been cases of morbidity also in children in 2013 compared with 2003.
The speed at which cancer advances, the prognosis, the degree of pain, and every other feature of the disease are not functions of the radiation dose to which the person is exposed.
DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) are generally accepted to be the most biologically significant lesion by which ionizing radiation causes cancer.
[28][29][30] A portion of the population possess a flawed DNA repair mechanism, and thus suffer a greater insult due to exposure to radiation.
Furthermore, National Cancer Institute literature indicates that chemical and physical hazards and lifestyle factors, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, and diet, significantly contribute to many of these same diseases.
[6] Evaluations of radiation's contribution to cancer incidence can only be done through large epidemiological studies with thorough data about all other confounding risk factors.
Ionizing radiation of 137-Cs causes cytoplasmic vacuolization, dilatation of the endoplasmic reticulum and destruction of mitochondria of various sizes and morphology, and dense areas of chromatin at the periphery of the nucleus of pancreatic, thyroidal and salivary cells.
Chris Busby of the self styled "European Committee on Radiation Risk", calls the ICRP model "fatally flawed" when it comes to internal exposure.
[6][54] Some people, such as those with nevoid basal cell carcinoma syndrome or retinoblastoma, are more susceptible than average to developing cancer from radiation exposure.
[6] Children and adolescents are twice as likely to develop radiation-induced leukemia as adults; radiation exposure before birth has ten times the effect.
However this cohort was also exposed to high heat, both from the initial nuclear flash of infrared light and following the blast due their exposure to the firestorm and general fires that developed in both cities respectively, so the survivors also underwent Hyperthermia therapy to various degrees.
Studies of occupational workers exposed to chronic low levels of radiation, above normal background, have provided mixed evidence regarding cancer and transgenerational effects.
The linear no-threshold model (LNT) hypothesis is accepted by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) and regulators around the world.
[58] According to this model, about 1% of the global population develop cancer as a result of natural background radiation at some point in their lifetime.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) recommends limiting artificial irradiation of the public to an average of 1 mSv (0.001 Sv) of effective dose per year, not including medical and occupational exposures.
[1] For comparison, radiation levels inside the US capitol building are 0.85 mSv/yr, close to the regulatory limit, because of the uranium content of the granite structure.
[13] According to the ICRP model, someone who spent 20 years inside the capitol building would have an extra one in a thousand chance of getting cancer, over and above any other existing risk.
(20 yr × 0.85 mSv/yr × 0.001 Sv/mSv × 5.5%/Sv ≈ 0.1%) That "existing risk" is much higher; an average American would have a one in ten chance of getting cancer during this same 20-year period, even without any exposure to artificial radiation.
Radiation was soon linked to bone cancer in the radium dial painters, but this was not confirmed until large-scale animal studies after World War II.
Eben Byers, a famous American socialite, died of multiple cancers in 1932 after consuming large quantities of radium over several years; his death drew public attention to dangers of radiation.
In the United States, the experience of the so-called Radium Girls, where thousands of radium-dial painters contracted oral cancers, popularized the warnings of occupational health associated with radiation hazards.
Robley D. Evans, at MIT, developed the first standard for permissible body burden of radium, a key step in the establishment of nuclear medicine as a field of study.
