Some Thoughts On Radiation

I am getting tired of correcting people with some totally incorrect thoughts on radiation. Not only laypeople, but even cases such as medical professionals who do things like compare a patient's radiation exposure from an X-ray or CT procedure to a microwave oven or cell phone use. The comparison is completely invalid. I'm not sure why this is done, but both possibilities are scary. Either the professional truly has no idea, in which case, I am very concerned about the fact they're allowed to expose people to potentially carcinogenic radiation; or they are deliberately lying to patients to put them at ease - also not a good situation. I've also heard of a case where a girl being exposed to a relatively high-radiation procedure was not to worry because "the radiation will be out of her body within a year." Technically, that's true. In fact, it will be much less than a year. Radiation doesn't stay in your body. The instant the X-ray is shot, the radiation is gone. However, the damage has just begun. For anywhere from two to thirty years, this girl likely now faces an increased risk of leukemia. For the remainder of her life, she is also likely to be at an increased risk of solid tumors, especially breast cancer given the procedure that was involved and the fact that the girl was at an age that is developmentally sensitive.

That's just one example of a good friend of mine. The same situation happens daily. Medical and professional situations involve radiation exposure that likely is often used more as a liability protection or to make you feel good they did something rather than out of a true medical need or detailed risk / benefit analysis. Increasingly, this involves CT scans in the ER - especially high radiation procedures when compared to flat X-rays.

Now, this is all "ionizing" radiation I've been talking about. This radiation carries more energy than visible light. It has enough energy to create ions, thus the reason it is known as ionizing radiation. This energy is the reason this type of radiation causes cancer. Visible light, infrared (radiated heat), and microwaves / radio waves are all known as "non-ionizing" radiation. Non-ionizing radiation doesn't have the energy to create ions, or, therefore, to cause the damage that we know is the mechanism by which ionizing radiation causes cancer. The only known effect of non-ionizing radiation is heat. Heat. Any cancer would have to occur by an as-yet-unknown mechanism. It cannot be compared to ionizing radiation.

Next up - how dangerous, really, is ionizing radiation? It seems it's probably not as dangerous as we think. There are a wide range of camps. They range from it being much more harmful than we realize, to it being essentially harmless in small doses, to it being slightly beneficial in low doses (almost like a vaccine). One mother of a son who received numerous X-rays as a newborn, then suffered leukemia at one and a half years was told by the Health Physics Society that it was extremely unlikely his X-rays caused his cancer. Personally, nobody knows. I have to admit, if I was in her shoes, I'd be blaming the X-rays. Rightly or not, I do not know - but I will tell you, I consider myself fairly educated and I'd probably naturally assume the X-rays caused it - especially since the exposure was at such a young age. The truth is, nobody knows what caused it and my assumption is no more or less valid than the Health Physics Society's. The Health Physics Society is of the general view that low levels of radiation exposure do carry a possible (but not certain) risk, but it is immeasurably small and shouldn't cause concern. Other groups believe the risk is much larger. A small few (mainly those who seem to have an interest in this being true) believe it may have a beneficial effect. Almost nobody believes that ionizing radiation poses the risk that the general public perceives it to.

So where did this fear come from? Well, what would our world be without people selling you $100 chunks of worthless plastic and metal to protect you from most-probably-mythical risks from non-ionizing radiation exposure? How would you fear the Russians and communism if the environmental impact and deaths resulting from Chernobyl hadn't been greatly exaggerated? How would Greenpeace and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament argue against nuclear power if it was known that far fewer people have died and far less environmental damage has been done with nuclear power than was done with, I dunno, a huge oil spill off the Gulf Coast, or the strip mining of coal to burn?

In the end, do the research, form your own opinions, and let me know what you think. As for me, I do believe there's a risk to ionizing exposure. I do believe it's unethical for professionals to compare ionizing radiation exposure to non-ionizing radiation or vice versa. I do believe that avoiding unnecessary ionizing radiation exposure is a good idea. Just like avoiding hot dogs is a good idea. But I'm not going to be unreasonably paranoid if I do end up with some ionizing radiation exposure. Or if I do end up eating a nitrate-laden hot dog. :-)