The report into Chernobyl also considered the number of fatalities per 100 000 people from cancer, and found that with the focus in the area that the fatalities rate actually dropped.

The cause of cancers is also dependent on the isotopes, for example iodine 131 typically causes thyroid cancer as the thyroid takes up Iodine. There were about 4000 cases of thyroid cancer in the region, but with the focus and early detection the cure rate was 99%.

So Jim's back of the cigarette box calculations are really fantasy, and perhaps he should try and engage a few more brain cells to provide us with a bit more than guess work.

Dear Jim, regardless of the effort, "facts" and "figures" in this, and your previous articles, the only way any of your cases can possibly be sustained is through a conspiracy theory directed at the IAEC.

Activism and advocacy are part of the wider (organic) protest and conservation body. As we have observed, when challenged, especially since “Climategate”, this organism reacts with almost instant tactical responses. Its defense grows louder and more incessant with each challenge.

This organism is also “opportunist” in nature. When an opportunity such as Fukushima presents itself, it cannot resist the opportunity to capitalize.

In the absence of data we are offered contradiction (to the IAEC), speculation, exaggeration, omission, emotion and partisan opinion. It is time you recognized who you are, what you are, who your audience is and what you are part of.

If you really have some “meat” to offer you need to take this challenge to the IAEC. Your movement and many similar ones have long “overegged the pudding”; you are leaving yourself with a reduced audience of only those who continue to respond to fear, uncertainty and doubt.

You use precisely the same model as the “warmertariat” and it is failing you. Sadly for many of us we must continue to “suck up” the screaming alarmism as its volume increases in direct proportion to its failings.

Surely it is time we on OLO had something better than a year 12 debate?

Paul Simon sang it.

"All lies and jest
Still, a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest"

That goes for both sides, by the way.

"That's an important point: there will always be uncertainty about the health effects of low-level radiation because it is an inherently complicated topic, but it's at least as likely that we're underestimating the risks as overestimating them."

This would be a valid argument only if you discount the evidence from the extensive medical studies that have been completed in the years following chernobyl. Which failed to find any evidence of increased cancer rates for any cancer other than Thyroid cancer in children which there was a small documented increase in. Thyroid cancer is generally preventable if iodine tablets are given and very treatable with early detection.

These extensive studies leave the theory that radiation even at the levels emitted from chernobyl (which was about as bad a nuclear plant failure as it's conceivably possible to have), causes widespread or numerous health problems, as a theory with no scientific evidence to support it.

Inversely it leaves the theory that radiation even at the levels emitted from chernobyl does not cause widespread or numerous health problems, as a theory with a large amount of scientific evidence to support it.

The trouble with claiming that "inherently complicated topics" like climate change or safety of low level radiation can't be measured, is that although the mechanisms of action often have not been fully elucidated, their effects can be accurately quantified through large empirical evidence based studies.

Dr. Green should be aware of the strength and limitations of the “Linear no Threshold Hypothesis.” Based principally on the life Span Study which consisted of about 120,000 survivors from the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, above an exposure of 50-100 mSv there is reasonable linear correlation between exposure and cancer induction. Below this exposure level; since radiation is a weak carcinogenic agent, and because of the numerous confounding (cancer inducing) factors, and the size of populations required for meaningful study, it is impossible to obtain direct epidemiological evidence of harm.

For the practical purpose of setting standards for occupational and environmental health which can be incorporated into law the LNTH is more than adequate. However, as a predictor of adverse radiological consequences from low exposure it is virtually useless. Apart from the logical difficulties in transferring coefficients derived from an immediate post war Japanese population to populations differing in both geography and time.

Arguments concerning the limitation of LNTH at low doses abound and include hormesis (adaptive response), cell killing including apoptosis, immune surveillance and of course DNA repair. DNA breaks both single, double and perhaps multiple occur from non-radiological as well as radiological causes. It is reasonably concluded that radiation tends to cause more double or multiple brakes which are less easily repaired. Of course a damaged cell does not necessarily lead to a cancer; the cell may die or fail to reproduce.

I have seen your article in “New Matilda (7 Apr 2011) in which you quote various life time estimates for the Chernobyl death toll from 985, 000 to 30,000. It is important to realise that these are theoretical or virtual deaths. There is no way these deaths can be either identified or counted. Even more important because of the known limitation of epidemiological studies excess deaths in the exposed population will never be convincingly detected.

I am therefore of the opinion that theoretical calculations of this type are of little, if any practical value.

There are a few other facts on radiation that should be mentioned. The first is that we all live in a sea of radiation, mostly from space, with a small amount from the ground, depending on what sort of rocks you live on. As a general rule, the background radiation will increase by 1% for every 21 metres you rise above sea level, due to reduced atmospheric shielding. Doesn't sound much, but it means that at the height of a jumbo jet the radiation is five times that at sea level (this is something they don't mention in the travel brochures), and that pilots and cabin crew have a much higher risk of cancer because of it. The UK government estimates that approximately 2000 people in Cornwall die each year from cancer caused by the radon emanating from the rocks there. Nothing said about that either. It is also estimated that 50,000 coal miners, mainly in China, die each year, making nuclear power by far the safest power source in the world. People opposed to nuclear power, mainly on the left, who think they can change human nature, also do not recognise the huge benefit of nuclear weapons on preventing the cold war from becoming hot. The fact is that large cities need power to survive, and countries like France have relied on safe nuclear power for over 50 years.