Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Fukushima meltdown unlikely to lead to large number of cancers: U.N. scientists

Security personnel stand guard near a steel gate that marks the border between Tamura and Okuma town in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture By Fredrik Dahl VIENNA (Reuters) - Japan's Fukushima nuclear reactor meltdown in March 2011 is unlikely to lead to a large number of people developing thyroid and other cancers like after Chernobyl in 1986, U.N. scientists said on Wednesday. While some children - fewer than a thousand - might have received radiation doses that in theory could increase the risk of thyroid cancer, the probability of that developing also remains low, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) said in a new study. The Chernobyl reactor explosion sent radioactive dust across much of Europe, while people close to the plant were exposed to radioactive iodine that contaminated milk. "No discernible changes in future cancer rates and hereditary diseases are expected due to exposure to radiation as a result of the Fukushima nuclear accident," UNSCEAR said in a statement accompanying its nearly 300-page study.








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