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Page added on May 23, 2013
Study: Fukushima Radiation Has Already Killed 14,000 Americans
Already 14,000 U.S. Deaths From Fukushima ?
A new study published in the peer-reviewed journal International Journal of Health Services alleges that 14,000 people have already died in the United States due to Fukushima.
Specifically, the authors of the study claim:
An estimated 14,000 excess deaths in the United States are linked to the radioactive fallout from the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear reactors in Japan, according to a major new article in the December 2011 edition of the International Journal of Health Services. This is the first peer-reviewed study published in a medical journal documenting the health hazards of Fukushima.[The authors] note that their estimate of 14,000 excess U.S. deaths in the 14 weeks after the Fukushima meltdowns is comparable to the 16,500 excess deaths in the 17 weeks after the Chernobyl meltdown in 1986. The rise in reported deaths after Fukushima was largest among U.S. infants under age one. The 2010-2011 increase for infant deaths in the spring was 1.8 percent, compared to a decrease of 8.37 percent in the preceding 14 weeks.
The authors seem – at first glance – to have pretty solid credentials. Janette Sherman, M.D. worked for the Atomic Energy Commission (forerunner of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) at the University of California in Berkeley, and for the U.S. Navy Radiation Defense Laboratory in San Francisco. She served on the EPA’s advisory board for 6 years, and has been an advisor to the National Cancer Institute on breast cancer. Dr. Sherman specializes in internal medicine and toxicology with an emphasis on chemicals and nuclear radiation.
Joseph J. Mangano is a public health administrator and researcher who has studied the connection between low-dose radiation exposure and subsequent risk of diseases such as cancer and damage to newborns. He has published numerous articles and letters in medical and other journals in addition to books, including Low Level Radiation and Immune System Disorders: An Atomic Era Legacy.
Sherman also claims that a study in British Columbia of infants under 1 year of age allegedly corroborates the increased deaths due to Fukushima:
Certainly radiation from Fukushima is dangerous, and could very well lead to negative health effects—even across the Pacific.
What Do Other Experts Say?
Pediatrician Helen Caldicott said recently:
May I say that North America has received quite a large fallout itself.
***
We’re going to see an incredible increase in cancer, leukemia, and — down the time track — genetic disease. Not just in Japan but in the Northern Hemisphere, particularly North America.
Caldicott also wrote in a New York Times Op-Ed:
Children are innately sensitive to the carcinogenic effects of radiation, fetuses even more so. Like Chernobyl, the accident at Fukushima is of global proportions. Unusual levels of radiation have been discovered in British Columbia, along the West Coast and East Coast of the United States and in Europe, and heavy contamination has been found in oceanic waters.
Nuclear engineer Gunderson says that the Japanese will suffer one million cancer deaths from Fukushima, and that we’ll see a statistically meaningful increase in cancer on the West Coast of America and Canada from Fukushima. Gundersen says that – after Japan – the most radioactive areas are the Cascades and Portland.
There is certainly evidence that West Coast residents – especially in Seattle, Portland and other areas near the Cascades – have been hit with some radiation. And there is certainly evidence that radioactive contamination has spread in the United States, and will continue to spread for some time to come.
Why Is The Science So Hotly Debated?
Why is there so much dispute about the number of deaths which Fukushima could cause on the West Coast?
Because radiation safety standards are set based on the assumption that everyone exposed is a healthy man in his 20s – and that radioactive particles ingested into the body cause no more damage than radiation hitting the outside of the body.
However – in the real world – radiation affects small children much more than full-grown adults. And small particles of radiation – called “internal emitters” – which get inside the body are much more dangerous than general exposures to radiation. See this and this.
In addition, American and Canadian authorities have virtually stopped monitoring airborn radiation, and are not testing fish for radiation. (Indeed, the EPA reacted to Fukushima by raising “acceptable” radiation levels.)
So – as in Japan – radiation is usually discovered by citizens and the handful of research scientists with funding to check, and not the government. See this, this, this, this, this and this.
The Japanese government’s entire strategy from day one has been to cover up the severity of the Fukushima accident. This has likely led to unnecessary, additional deaths.
Indeed, the core problem is that all of the world’s nuclear agencies are wholly captured by the nuclear industry … as are virtually all of the supposedly independent health agencies.
So the failure of the American, Canadian and other governments to test for and share results is making it difficult to hold an open scientific debate about what is happening.
17 Comments on "Study: Fukushima Radiation Has Already Killed 14,000 Americans"
rollin on Thu, 23rd May 2013 12:08 pm
A blind eye is turned to actually investigating the effects of the many toxic products of industrial and military civilization. Even after they are brought to light they seem to fade into the background again as no one really pursues the full effects or tracking the various environmental pathways.
dissident on Thu, 23rd May 2013 12:26 pm
Let’s get this straight, levels of radiation much lower than regional variations within the USA itself caused thousands of deaths? This passes for “peer reviewed”? There is no actual link to this alleged article. Mangano has been at this racket for a while. He claimed that thousands of US babies died by cherry picking statistics (i.e. the natural variation in daily and weekly deaths is larger than the claimed Fukushima effect — correlation is not causation).
The world is headed towards climate oblivion (yes really) and lying shills such as Mangano are scaring the sheeple with nuclear phantoms. When the crops start failing on a routine basis, well before 2050, there will be *millions* dying for real and not some just in some retarded games with statistics.
BillT on Thu, 23rd May 2013 12:33 pm
While this may be an exaggeration, the amounts of radiation being released by Fukushima is still deadly, and much of it is being carried by air and water currents to North America. The real death toll will take a few decades to become obvious, but it probably has been increased as fetus’s and new borns would be much more susceptible.
I suspect that the radiation levels are much higher than we think because the government stopped publishing them shortly after the accident. And then the ‘safe’ levels were raised several tines, all under the MSM radar. We have 104 of these radioactive bombs in the us, all waiting for a Fukushima type event to happen. They will be killing for the next 100,000 years, each one of them.
Arthur on Thu, 23rd May 2013 12:56 pm
The world is yearning for stories.
KingM on Thu, 23rd May 2013 2:10 pm
Don’t we have enough real stuff to worry about without these bogus nuclear Fukushima stories clogging up the site?
J-Gav on Thu, 23rd May 2013 3:57 pm
Whatever the actual toll of Fukushima to date (and the 14 000 dead figure is clearly an exaggeration) 2 or 3 things should not be forgotten along the way: 1 – spikes in thyroid disorders have been detected in the coastal northwest, not to mention the burgeoning cases, some already evolved to cancer, in the immediate Fukushima region, mostly among children; 2 -TEPCO and the Japanese govt have lied from the outset about the severity of the incident and today’s poorly protected clean-up crews will no doubt pay a high price; 3 – Former Nuclear Regulatory Commission chief Gregory Jazcko recently made an urgent call foto phase out ALL U.S. nuclear plants as quickly as possible. You think he might know something we don’t know?
Kenz300 on Thu, 23rd May 2013 4:48 pm
The disaster in Japan continues today with no end in sight.
We need to learn from Japan’s mistakes.
Fukushima Update | Nuclear News from Japan
http://fukushimaupdate.com/
dissident on Thu, 23rd May 2013 5:29 pm
The only mistake in Japan was the idiotic copy and paste construction approach to the GE reactor. Putting the backup generators in the basement for a facility situated on the coast with tsunami risk is beyond retarded. There is a hill right behind the reactor where they should have placed the generators.
Everyone is so concerned about radiation. How about mercury from all the coal power plants? It migrates far from the source region and gets converted into methyl mercury, a potent toxin, in the soil and in the water. How many tens of thousands of deaths from this risk? When all the people who are so worried about minute variations in background radiation acknowledge the threat from industrial pollution then they will gain some credibility.
The notion that thousands of babies and adults have died in the US due to Fukushima radiation is totally absurd. Comparing Fukushima to Chernobyl is instant exposure as a crank nutjob. There was no graphite fire spewing corium into the environment at Fukushima so there was nothing like the Chernobyl plume that wafted over the world carried by the atmospheric circulation. The vast majority of the radiation released by Fukushima was into the water. This radioactive sea water has not reached the US coast yet. And by the time it does reach the US western coast it will have diluted quite a bit.
Let me repeat the point that is ignored by the hysterics: any radiation change in the US due to Fukushima is smaller than local variations from region to region (e.g. Denver vs. Chicago). So all that claim it was lethal would have to explain how people have not died off from larger regional variations. Integrated over decades and centuries there would have been tens of millions of deaths if the alleged hazard level was real.
Fate on Thu, 23rd May 2013 5:36 pm
I read the actual study, and while their statistical analysis is reasonable to show some type of anomaly, it’s difficult to draw any real conclusions from it.
For example, it shows evidence of more deaths than expected throughout the entirety of the U.S., but this could be from any cause. Correctly, the study does not make claims that “radiation has already killed 14,000 Americans” as this disingenuous article claims, but suggests instead that further research is needed.
The link is extremely speculative at this point, because it does not isolate radiation-related illnesses, or the areas where certain types of radioactive elements were concentrated, nor is the data set that the study is based on necessarily an accurate sample of deaths in the U.S., since data submission is voluntary and incomplete.
J-Gav on Thu, 23rd May 2013 6:06 pm
Diss: Though I can understand a certain skepticism upon seeing them trot out ole Arnie Gunderson and Helen Caldicott once again in this article, I think you under-estimate the real dangers of nuclear. They are manifold: 1 – power outages due to drought as when the rivers where they dump the cooling water run low, they have to stop, otherwise the heat would kill everything in the river; 2 – the numerous spent fuel pools around the world housing them in Fukushima-like conditions ie subject to earthquakes, flooding or grid problems (for the cooling). This is really multiple disasters waiting to happen; 3 – not to mention, or just barely, the lies and cover-ups in the industry concerning true costs (massive construction over-runs, decommissioning,insurance – uh, no, there aren’t actually any insurance companies which take on that sort of risk – THEY PASS IT ON TO US), true operating conditions …
BillT on Fri, 24th May 2013 1:58 am
Try reading this is you are skeptical…
http://theautomaticearth.com/Energy/widely-visible-symbols-of-human-folly.html
Others on Fri, 24th May 2013 3:30 am
This is a Peak Bluff.
Even in Japan only 10 people were killed in this accident. Rest of the deaths were because of Tsunami.
It would have made big news had even a few Americans died.
Japanese suffered a lot because of Nuclear Shutdown by
* Paying more for electricity
* Switching off Air conditioner in peak summer days.
* Nation paid billions of $ in Oil Bills.
Its high time they restart those reactors 1 by 1.
bryan on Fri, 24th May 2013 3:40 am
The day the Fuk-D reactor exploded I went outside & checked the background radiation here in North-Central BC.
About two weeks later the rate was up about 5 times. That is, indeed within regional variations.
For example there are so many hot spots around Great Slave Lake that the ~70 kg Cosmos 954 Plutonium core was never found.
However, a 5 times increase in background radiation is definitely measurable. I’m not too concerned, but it would be nice to be informed.
bryan on Fri, 24th May 2013 3:44 am
My mistake,U-235 core.
DC on Fri, 24th May 2013 6:07 am
Sorry Others, but all the Japaneses gov’t, working hand in glove, with the notoriously corrupt and inefficient US-NRC, have been hiding the truth and downplaying the effects over there since day 1.
The information the Japanese gov’t releases has zero credibility. Even the normally conformist Japanese no longer believe anything their govt is saying about Fukushima.
Let me tell you something about Radiation deaths. Its not like in the movies where people drop dead in the streets ok? You can get a lethal dose of radiation from a nuke accident and still take years, even decades to die. As far as im concerned, the poorly trained and sloppy ‘clean-up’ crews Tepco hired are basically dead already. The lucky ones that avoided the hot spots will probably be ok, the unlucky ones?
Dead men walking.
Seagull on Fri, 24th May 2013 2:02 pm
Pathetic scare mongering for the gullible.
beamofthewave on Sat, 25th May 2013 4:29 am
no it is not fearmongering, it is an ongoing problem just getting worse.