You could get run over by a truck next week - which wold make it fairly moot worrying about getting cancer ten years from now. Let's face it, life doesn't come with a warranty. Doesn't mean you have to go on a fishing trip near the outflow valves of the Fukushima plant. Doesn't mean you have to hide under your bed till doomsday either...

Sarkasm aside, you have to weigh risks vs. benefits for yourself. Gathering infromation is part of that risk assessment. Take everything the government - any government - tells you with a grain of salt. As pointed out by other posters, politics and big bidness are often intertwined in ways that aren't always beneficiary to the public as a whole, but that problem is not just limited to Japan. Bikini Atoll, La Hague, Sellafield, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, you name it, unless you have a degree in nuclear physics and a lab full of fancy equipment you won't be able to find out if, or to what extent you're getting fed b...t by the powers that be.

Get a Geiger counter, get a dosimeter, keep in mind that there's always a certain level of natural radiation. Those two gadgets will help you to steer clear of hot spots and keep track of your personal irradiation level, but they won't tell you a thing about cancer. There's dozens of different isotopes, with varying degrees of activity, with varying carcinogenic properties.
Sorting that out could easily fill a library shelf, and it still doesn't guarantee you anything. Heck, I've known people who never touched a cigarette in their live and died of lung cancer, I also known folks who smoked like factory chimney and lived to a ripe old age...

All right, if you pick fresh veggies out of your yard, and they glow in the dark...Don't eat them......geez. Other than that I wouldn't worry about it.

i do not know if this is true or not.

Japan government prepares plan to flee Tokyo - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

That article about "fleeing" Tokyo has become a bit famous around the net as an example of extremely misleading, fear mongering journalism... Not to mention irresponsible. It has been reported numerous times to journalism authorities, and right now there is actually a movement to get them to remove the outright fabricated title.

The government has been planning on a secondary base to move the government to in the event of a catastrophic event for the past 30 some years. Every country has these plans. Japan has not suddenly started looking into this after the earthquake or for reasons to do with radiation. It is a normal government thing to plan for a situation where the capital is no longer able to be used safely.
There have been various candidates put out on the table of the past so many years, but they don't like to actually make their plans clear lest the new base of operations be put in danger also in a war situation.

I would be flat out shocked if there was any country out there that did not have plans in place for what to do if the capital suffered a horrible event. It would be stupid not to.

What is even more pathetic is that there wasn't even any new movement related to this. Journalists dug up the simple fact that the Japanese government has a "backup" plan for a new capital and decided to make it into a sensationalist story. :rolleyes:

Out of REAL news, I guess.

As I said: Take anything the governemnt - any government - tells you with a grain of salt.

Maybe I should add : Take anything the journalists - any journalist - tells you with a pound of salt.

What she said! :)

best,

............john

Agree .

I did read the whole post with a thought, but I still wouldn't go that road. One might have "who cares, let's enjoy life!" attitude now, but in ten years one might have a family and kids. For most people, life still continues after several years. Hell, I've already had four of those "ten years later..." thingies. I have no interest in dying of cancer, and the risk of radiation related cancer kind of grows substantially when living near a nuclear accident site and having a government who has new clothes.
Sure, you can get hit by a truck next week. Especially true for people who continue to walk in the middle of the road despite seeing headlights.

Yes, i get the point. Don't you get... how to say, getting yourself killed? I mean there is a chance that is perfect (assume is perfect), and you got life shorten because of radiation. Don't you get worried? After all once exposure to internal (man-made) radiation, it is basically the beginning of painful dead (I know everyone will get old and die one day) but what I am trying to say is man-made radiation is not the same as natural radiation which our body can deal with it harmlessly.

And cesium has such a long half-life. The teas in Shizuoka were contaminated but does that mean the soil are also contaminated? Does removing the top soil which lowers the radiation concentration means the future teas will not be contaminated?

Man-made radiation accumlates in the body. If the govt. does not report radiation on certain food which it was actually contaminated, you will be accumlating man-made radiation in your body. And these man-made radiation won't go away unlike natural radiation. You guys are currently in Japan making a living. But it sounds it is alright for you to accumlate radiation in your body.

I am not saying that we are to be unfair to those who honestly produced products free of contamination. I agree even with geigar counter, it does not really guarantee anything (may even give false impression if used wrongly or human error) but Japan is so huge. The govt. does not check every single grain of food or rice but through random checking isn't it?

Or just simply trust the govt. They say don't eat, you don't eat. Nothing else reported, you eat. How about seafood? Western Japan and south of it, their seafood does not always come from Sea of Japan right? there is bound to have fishes from Pacific ocean. The contamination of the sea is still not 100% confirmed due to ever changing currents.

Rice? (okay, rice I guess we wait for August & September results?)

Overall, can we trust the current govt. on food safety? Particularly preventing the contaminated food going into the market. Will food safety resume back to pre-fukushima nuclear days, in which apart from worrying E.coil or other stuff, radiation free food safety?

Even until today, Chernobyl caused contamination is still found in food in europe (which of course they banned). 5 years down the road (maybe a big too far of prediction) can Japan govt. regain the radiation-free food safety?

Of course like in recent China meat scandal. But wait, man-made nuclear contamination glows? Are you sure radiation can be seen in the dark by seeing it glows?

That was a joke....

Yes, that's what I am trying to say. We have no proof of other food & beverages are contaminated or not. Japan is so big, the government personnel checking the food are in a shortage of personel (which in turn cannot literally check every single food)

I am saying this because in fact the govt. agrees they are lacking of personel. Another point is radiation settles unevenly. Food grown in huge fields can be contamined in one corner and not the remaining area.

When random pick, you pick the non-contaminated and scanned with results of no contamination and you accept that the entire field is not contaminated which in fact, a corner of it is contamined and it goes to the market.

Of course no one wants to die painfully. I am not saying there are no possibilities that other factors can shorten a life. The radiation danger now is not natural background radiation but man-made radiation, onw that unlike the natural, can accumulate in your body. The more you eat contamined food unknowingly, the more Bq you have, the shorter the painful day arrives.

What I want to know is why confident that Western and Southern Japan does not have contamination? Why rice test is not tested in all prefectures? (unless rice are not grown in all prefectures, correct me on this)

Locally grown veges and fruits? Soil leaves contamination was found only after it was out on sale. Yes, people had return, yes govt. recall. How about those who do not even know or simply don't care?

I am sorry if I created any unnecessary emotions.

I am in total confuse and literally heart pain. I know there are people who are suffering worst than me. I want to study there and help out whatever academic knowledge I have in the future. I been to Japan so many times and now with all these uncertainties of radiation contamination in food (worse, teas and rice and seafood, the main ingredients in Japanese diet).

Making me unable to study and work there has somehow "killed" me because of TEPCO and all the ignorance of danger of aging nuclear plants. Nuclear should not even exist.

I can guarantee my health if I go there and yet I want to save them from man-made radiation. It is not a joke. It is man-made radiation. No amount is safe.

Sorry for any unnecessary emotions.
I really don't know what to do.

How about maybe instead of thinking that foreigners need to come in and "save" the Japanese becasue "we" know better, we let THEM decide the fate of their own culture and lives? If THEY distrust how the government has handled things, then THEY can do something about it. If THEY think that they want to try to live without nuclear energy, then THEY can shut all the plants down. If THEY want outsiders to come in and tell them how to do things, let THEM ask you for that.

best,

.............john

Data that scholar who dissented to nuclear power generation settled.
(The specialty is a scholar who is researching the proliferation of the volcanic ash)
Attachment 11706
Attachment 11707

Europe of the radioactive substance scattered on land is more abundant.
When the resident from Chernobyl to the vicinity of Germany has been annihilated, I give it up.

Consequence of grand human experimentation by Chernobyl lol
"The metabolism is an athletic child" It gets a cancer of the thyroid gland in case of being in the heavily polluted area.

Well I would suggest stop worrying so damned much. Truly the chances of you eating something that would have an adverse affect on your health because of radiation is really very, very slim. There are probably plenty of other things you do in your life everyday right now that have more chance of adversely affecting your health. Simple things like getting into a car and driving would have far more risk of injury and death than being exposed to harmful amounts of radiation. Are you terrified everytime you get into a car??

Get past the hype and look at the real risk. It's almost negligible. Personally I would have no problem moving back to Japan. I would have no issues with my daughter living there. Obviously I probably wouldn't move to Fukushima right at the moment but I don't think this is what you are planning either? If you were moving to say within around 100km of the reactors maybe I could understand your concerns but if you're looking to move to somewhere like Tokyo I just don't get it.

No, of course not. That's just the silliest hollywood joke about it and perpetuated by physicists to ridicule the whole notion.

There is, however, a bluish Cherenkov radiation that occurs when radiating particles move faster than the speed of light (in vacuum), which can only happen when the medium slows photons more than the particles, i.e. under water etc (where photons move at 75% of their top speed and therefore matter can be accelerated beyond local c). It has applications in nuclear industry, but of course there are strict preconditions for it to occur. Hence, just a joke.

Actually, the chances of eating harmful amounts of contaminated food during the 30-40 years that this is going to continue, are quite substantial. There is absolutely nothing wrong about taking steps and learning the safest way through this, as there is nothing wrong with driving safely and looking both ways when crossing the road, if one is concerned about traffic accidents, etc.

Thank you very much everyone who has contributed into this topic. Please kindly add in more information for future readers who are concerned with this tread's topic.

Thanks.

what is that?

The E.coil contamination when ppl eat raw beef.

How do you say 'with a grain of salt' in non-idiom English?