23-08-2016, 01:22 PM
These posts originated from the 'Baku Olympiad' thread
Re: Baku Olympiad
by amuir » Mon Aug 22, 2016 1:35 pm
Walter, food for thought there.
You seem knowledgeable about radiation risk. Is it safe to live under electricity pylons as our local school is now being constructed beside them ?
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://twitter.com/MartinRooney9/statu">https://twitter.com/MartinRooney9/statu</a><!-- m --> ... 7219277824
Is it safe to use a mobile phone regularly from the age of 10 ? Are there any definitive articles ?
I was just thinking that the cumulative effect of radiation is so much greater for people nowadays, say for a current junior playing regularly in international tournaments with all these x-rays to encounter.
Re: Baku Olympiad
by WBuchanan » Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:17 pm
The govt has gradually been acknowledging the link with low frequency and low level magnetic fields, in particular the outcome of the aggregation of numerous studies across the decades – that an exposure 0.4 microtesla (not untypical near pylons) is associated with a doubling of the child leukemia rate. Acknowledging in private that is, not so much in public, as it’s a bit loth to start paying for expensive solutions, like running the pylons underground.
Zhao Meta analysis on leukemia link <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24388073">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24388073</a><!-- m -->
Ahlbom <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10944614">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10944614</a><!-- m -->
Kheifets <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20877339">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20877339</a><!-- m -->
Child leukemia is still a rare occurrence so I wouldn’t panic and you are right to first consider this alongside other sources of exposure. The mobile is something you can more easily do something about (though the child might keep falling out with you until they turn 16 and then they can get one themselves if they want) – not just the industry the government has maintained the approach of kicking the issue into the ‘long grass’, studiously avoiding investigating the effects that are all but established. As I said in the first post, the evidence that EMF (at mobile-type levels) causes biological effects is overwhelming. Eg, see <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.who.int/peh-emf/meetings/arc">http://www.who.int/peh-emf/meetings/arc</a><!-- m --> ... eswari.pdf
There is no one article just the weight of evidence. It’s a complex area spanning numerous disciplines. Even the pylons risk may depend on the polarity of the magnetic field, according to some eminently respectable researchers. If you look at official pronouncements you will mostly see spin, which is not easy to debunk without some knowledge. I think the best thing to remember is that (so-called) safety guidelines were only designed to prevent sudden shocks, etc, due to heating effects from lower exposures - these guidelines expressly excluded cancer and other long term illnesses that could arise from low-level exposures . So when you read someone saying that some exposure level is well below safety guidelines you know there is fobbing off going on.
Cheers
Re: Baku Olympiad
by Phil Thomas » Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:28 pm
Basing this upon Walter's quoted sources.
Great posts Walter much appreciated
A one in 10,000 risk is hard to measure. Looking for linearity or non linearity below 10 millisieverts (level assumed to give a one in 10,000 risk of cancer spread across a lifetime) is fraught with practical difficulties - trying to measure numbers very close to zero, its not easy
With the assumption of linearity. 1 hour subsonic flying time calculates to a 1 in 2 million risk level.
The dose from a scan at 0.1 microsievert equates to to radiation received during 1.2 minutes flying.
For me that is negligible. But as always the risk is not zero - calculates through to a 1 in 100 million extra risk of cancer sometime in one's lifetime.
When the national lottery first appeared the odds of winning were in in 14,000,000
For mobile phones (microwave radiation) and power lines (magnetic fields) multiple studies have been inconclusive. That means too low to measure accurately - inconclusive unless you cherry pick the data.
All this concern about miniscule levels of risk.........
Yet airports continue to sell tobacco products and we continue to inhabit granite rich areas (radon gas).
Public Health England publishes the following table showing the risk of lung cancer for smokers, non smokers and ex smokers. The results vary with radon level in Becquerels. (The simple radiation unit, 1 Becquerel equals one radioactive decay per second).
Columns not well alligned I'm afraid
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks">http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks</a><!-- m --> should be a working link.
Indoor radon level (Bq m-3) Non-smoker Ex-smoker gave up at age 30 Ex-smoker gave up at 50 Current Smoker
20 Less than 1 in 200 1 in 60 1 in 18 1 in 7
200 1 in 190 1 in 48 1 in 14 1 in 5
800 1 in 100 1 in 28 1 in 8 1 in 3
So for a smoker, who quit at age 50, the risk of lung cancer increases from
From 1 in 7 in a low radon environment (20 Bq)
to 1 in 3 in a high radon environment (800Bq)
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks">http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks</a><!-- m --> should be a working link to Public Health England data
In summary
The 1 in 100,000,000 risk does not worry me. (one airport X ray scan)
A 1 in 14,000,000 chance tells me that, with more than 95 % certainty, I won't win the lottery this week - not unless I buy more than 700,000 tickets
Less than 1 in 200 risk (non smoker low radon area) is unfortunate but can't be reduced.
1 in 3 to 1 in 7 chance (depending upon radon level in home) of getting lung cancer for smokers who quit at 50 tells me that
Smoking is dangerous.
Re: Baku Olympiad
by amuir » Mon Aug 22, 2016 1:35 pm
Walter, food for thought there.
You seem knowledgeable about radiation risk. Is it safe to live under electricity pylons as our local school is now being constructed beside them ?
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://twitter.com/MartinRooney9/statu">https://twitter.com/MartinRooney9/statu</a><!-- m --> ... 7219277824
Is it safe to use a mobile phone regularly from the age of 10 ? Are there any definitive articles ?
I was just thinking that the cumulative effect of radiation is so much greater for people nowadays, say for a current junior playing regularly in international tournaments with all these x-rays to encounter.
Re: Baku Olympiad
by WBuchanan » Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:17 pm
The govt has gradually been acknowledging the link with low frequency and low level magnetic fields, in particular the outcome of the aggregation of numerous studies across the decades – that an exposure 0.4 microtesla (not untypical near pylons) is associated with a doubling of the child leukemia rate. Acknowledging in private that is, not so much in public, as it’s a bit loth to start paying for expensive solutions, like running the pylons underground.
Zhao Meta analysis on leukemia link <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24388073">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24388073</a><!-- m -->
Ahlbom <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10944614">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10944614</a><!-- m -->
Kheifets <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20877339">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20877339</a><!-- m -->
Child leukemia is still a rare occurrence so I wouldn’t panic and you are right to first consider this alongside other sources of exposure. The mobile is something you can more easily do something about (though the child might keep falling out with you until they turn 16 and then they can get one themselves if they want) – not just the industry the government has maintained the approach of kicking the issue into the ‘long grass’, studiously avoiding investigating the effects that are all but established. As I said in the first post, the evidence that EMF (at mobile-type levels) causes biological effects is overwhelming. Eg, see <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.who.int/peh-emf/meetings/arc">http://www.who.int/peh-emf/meetings/arc</a><!-- m --> ... eswari.pdf
There is no one article just the weight of evidence. It’s a complex area spanning numerous disciplines. Even the pylons risk may depend on the polarity of the magnetic field, according to some eminently respectable researchers. If you look at official pronouncements you will mostly see spin, which is not easy to debunk without some knowledge. I think the best thing to remember is that (so-called) safety guidelines were only designed to prevent sudden shocks, etc, due to heating effects from lower exposures - these guidelines expressly excluded cancer and other long term illnesses that could arise from low-level exposures . So when you read someone saying that some exposure level is well below safety guidelines you know there is fobbing off going on.
Cheers
Re: Baku Olympiad
by Phil Thomas » Mon Aug 22, 2016 3:28 pm
Basing this upon Walter's quoted sources.
Great posts Walter much appreciated
A one in 10,000 risk is hard to measure. Looking for linearity or non linearity below 10 millisieverts (level assumed to give a one in 10,000 risk of cancer spread across a lifetime) is fraught with practical difficulties - trying to measure numbers very close to zero, its not easy
With the assumption of linearity. 1 hour subsonic flying time calculates to a 1 in 2 million risk level.
The dose from a scan at 0.1 microsievert equates to to radiation received during 1.2 minutes flying.
For me that is negligible. But as always the risk is not zero - calculates through to a 1 in 100 million extra risk of cancer sometime in one's lifetime.
When the national lottery first appeared the odds of winning were in in 14,000,000
For mobile phones (microwave radiation) and power lines (magnetic fields) multiple studies have been inconclusive. That means too low to measure accurately - inconclusive unless you cherry pick the data.
All this concern about miniscule levels of risk.........
Yet airports continue to sell tobacco products and we continue to inhabit granite rich areas (radon gas).
Public Health England publishes the following table showing the risk of lung cancer for smokers, non smokers and ex smokers. The results vary with radon level in Becquerels. (The simple radiation unit, 1 Becquerel equals one radioactive decay per second).
Columns not well alligned I'm afraid
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks">http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks</a><!-- m --> should be a working link.
Indoor radon level (Bq m-3) Non-smoker Ex-smoker gave up at age 30 Ex-smoker gave up at 50 Current Smoker
20 Less than 1 in 200 1 in 60 1 in 18 1 in 7
200 1 in 190 1 in 48 1 in 14 1 in 5
800 1 in 100 1 in 28 1 in 8 1 in 3
So for a smoker, who quit at age 50, the risk of lung cancer increases from
From 1 in 7 in a low radon environment (20 Bq)
to 1 in 3 in a high radon environment (800Bq)
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks">http://www.ukradon.org/information/risks</a><!-- m --> should be a working link to Public Health England data
In summary
The 1 in 100,000,000 risk does not worry me. (one airport X ray scan)
A 1 in 14,000,000 chance tells me that, with more than 95 % certainty, I won't win the lottery this week - not unless I buy more than 700,000 tickets
Less than 1 in 200 risk (non smoker low radon area) is unfortunate but can't be reduced.
1 in 3 to 1 in 7 chance (depending upon radon level in home) of getting lung cancer for smokers who quit at 50 tells me that
Smoking is dangerous.