Courage and heroism

In August 2012, the journal Nature published evidence that artificial radionuclides from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant caused physiological and genetic damage to the pale grass blue butterfly Zizeeria mara [1]. Among the team at University of the Ryukyus Okinawa undertaking the research was a mature student in her first year, Chiyo Nohara.  Chiyo died on 28 October 2015 at the age of 60 from a heart attack. Chiyo was a scientist who set out to protect her fellow human beings despite great pressure from the authorities and at great risk to her own life.

Chiyo once said to a friend [2] “No matter how much you researched and knew, it would be pointless if you die before letting the world know about what you learned”. Fortunately, Chiyo’s research was published, and provided the first scientific evidence of harm to a living organism from the accident at Fukushima.  I will not describe the research itself, which is available in print [1]. (See also [3] Fukushima Mutant Butterflies Confirm Harm from Low-Dose Radiation, SiS 56.) Instead, I would like to concentrate on her response to the accident at Fukushima, and pay tribute to the intelligence, courage, and energy of Nohara and her team-mates in initiating the research, in undertaking the fieldwork, conducting laboratory experiments, and later defending their work against critics.

Chiyo was born 8 May 1955 in Ube city of Yamaguchi prefecture. She studied economics at Okayama University and Aichi University; taught accounting at university level, publishing numerous papers and was involved in public auditing at a local and national government level. But in 2010, at the age of 55, partly because her own daughter suffered allergies, Chiyo became interested in environmental health. She resigned from her university post and enrolled in the Biology graduate school programme of the Faculty of Science at University of the Ryukyus.

Accident at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant

When the accident at Fukushima occurred in March 2011, Chiyo was only in her first year of study. Nevertheless, she persuaded her team that research in the Fukushima area was of crucial importance, and that it had to be started immediately. She had already been active in donating money and supplies to the victims of the tsunami and earthquake, but she said [4]:“I want to go to Fukushima.  I want to see the stricken areas with my own eyes”.  She said she “wanted to do anything” to help the people affected by the accident.

The graduate team, led by Associate Professor Joji Otaki, specialised in molecular physiology, and had been researching the mechanism of the pale grass blue butterfly’s (Zizeeria maha) peculiar colour patterns which are influenced by environmental conditions such as temperature. He saw that this species of butterfly could be used as an environmental indicator.

Conducting research in the contaminated territories

After much heart-searching three members of the graduate school decided to go to the contaminated territories of Fukushima. They all signed a written disclaimer [4]: “I am fully aware of the dangers of my activities in relatively high radiation level areas”.  But several days before their scheduled trip to Fukushima, they were summoned to the Dean’s office. Chiyo and her team were subjected to some aggressive and unpleasant questioning from the Dean, the sub-Dean, and another member of staff. They were challenged with regard to their preparation and planning, and about the reaction they would elicit from people in Fukushima prefecture “when they see a team of the University of the Ryukyus pursuing butterflies with butterfly nets, while they are desperately searching for missing relatives [from the tsunami].”

Eventually, permission was given, subject to the correct radiological protection measures and strict crisis management planning in the event of another explosion at the nuclear power station. Interestingly the sub-Dean paid his respect to the team later saying that many research teams will not take risks for fear of losing funds but “this research team doesn’t care about such risks.  They just want to know what is happening there.  I support their work, but they make me nervous”.

The team left on 13 May 2011 for a six day field trip. They carried a Geiger counter to record radiation levels and gave themselves a strict 20 minute time limit at any one site. If no butterflies were found they moved on. They visited 15 sites in 4 prefectures (Tokyo, Ibaraki, Fukushima, Miyagi), and flew back to Okinawa on the 18 May with 144 butterflies.

Chiyo worries about her health

The work was continued over the next months in the university laboratories in Okinawa, and in September the team visited Fukushima prefecture once again and collected more specimens. Part of the laboratory research involved feeding the butterflies on oxalis corniculata contaminated by radionuclides from the Fukushima area. It was Chiyo and her husband who made the trips to the contaminated territories to collect contaminated oxalis – 15 trips in the space of 18 months. Inevitably Chiyo worried about her health. A friend said [2] “every time she went to Fukushima to collect butterflies, and every time she measured the radiation level of the contaminated oxalis, her physical condition deteriorated.But she did not want young students to do the job.”

The team collected first-voltine adults in the Fukushima area in May 2011 and some of these showed abnormalities. They reared two generations of progeny in the laboratories in Okinawa and found that although these had not been exposed to radiation, they had more severe abnormalities. They were also able to produce similar abnormalities in individuals from non-contaminated areas by external and internal low-dose exposures. Adult butterflies were collected from the Fukushima area in September 2011, and these butterflies showed more severe abnormalities than those collected in May. The team concluded that the artificial radionuclides from the Fukushima nuclear power plant had caused physiological and genetic damage to this species of butterfly.

Research “important and overwhelming in its implications”

The research was first published in August 2012 in Nature and international response was immediate[2]. The BBC detailed the research findings and included the comment that the study was “important and overwhelming in its implications for both the human and biological communities in Fukushima” [5]. Le Monde in France was more explicit, saying that although officially no-one has yet died from the effects of the radiation from Fukushima, many experts believe that people will fall ill and die in the years to come [6]. The BBC and the German TV company, ARD, came to interview Professor Otaki in Okinawa, and the American TV networks ABC, CNN and Fox also covered the story.

The research elicited a huge number of comments (276 139 in the first six months up to January 2013, according to the publisher’s website). The comments were answered by Chiyo and the team in a new paper in 2013 [7]. Eleven points were discussed in depth including the choice of this species as an environmental indictor, the possibility of latitude-dependent forewing-size reduction, the rearing conditions and the implications of the accumulation of genetic mutations. Many of the comments expressed were unscientific and politically motivated and could not be answered for that reason.

In Japan the research is not widely known

The mainstream Japanese media did not report the significance of this research, except for a few minor references. On personal blogs and Twitter accounts the research findings were widely disseminated but not always positively. The lack of press freedom in Japan since the Fukushima accident is very disquieting. In the 2010 Press Freedom Index of countries in the world, Japan ranked 11. By 2015 it had fallen to 61, and this is in large part due to secrecy about the accident at Fukushima [8]. In Europe and the United States, pictures of the pale grass blue butterfly, Z. maha and its abnormalities, post-Fukushima, can be accessed within seconds, but not so in Japan. The Japanese government’s response to the accident has been overwhelmingly to give falsely reassuring “information”. An example is Prime Minister Abe declaring to the Olympic Bid Committee in 2013 that “the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is under control”, which is clearly not true [9].

It is an uphill struggle. Scientists and non-scientists in the West have a duty to help the Japanese people. Just as at Chernobyl, there is [10] “a fragile human chain made up, in the East, of activists in a country trapped in radioactive contamination and in the West, by activists who support them against scientific lies.” In 2014, Chiyo travelled to Geneva to present her research at the Forum on the Genetic Effects of Ionising Radiation, organized by the Collective IndependentWHO [11]. She was already ill. IndependentWHO have published the proceedings of this Forum and dedicated them to Chiyo Nohara, with the words “She died in the cause of scientific truth”. Within the pages of Science in Society, dedicated to scientific independence, I salute her. But we would be doing Chiyo Nohara a disservice if we did not add that the implications of her research are that no-one, and especially not children, should be living in the areas contaminated by the accident at Fukushima.

Susie Greaves

ISIS Report 07/01/16

Published first in ISIS – Institute of Science in Society

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/Honouring_the_Life_and_Work_of_Chiyo_Nohara.php

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References
1 – Hiyama A, Nohara C, Kinjo S, Taira W, Gima S Tanahara A and Otaki JM. The biological impacts of the Fukushima nuclear accident on the pale grass blue butterfly.Nature Scientific Reports2, 570, DOI: 10.1038/srep00570

2 – Obituary of Chiyo Nohara  by Oshidori Mako in Days Japan, December issue, 2015, Vol.12, No.12, p.23.

3 – Ho M W. Fukushima mutant butterflies confirm harm from low dose radiation. Science in Society 56, 48-51, 2012.

4 – “Prometheus Traps: Pursuing Butterflies”, Nakayama Y,  Asahi Shimbun, 2015 (Series no.4: 12 July 2015:, no.5: 14 July 2015, no.6: 15 July 2015, no.7: 16 July, 2015, no.8: 17 July 2015, no.10: 19 July 2015)

5 – “Severe abnormalities found in Fukushima butterflies”, Nick Crumpton,  13 August 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19245818

6 – “Des papillons mutants autour de Fukushima”, Philippe Pons, 15 August 2012, http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2012/08/15/des-papillons-mutants-autour-de-fukushima_1746252_3244.html

7 – Hiyama A, Nohara C, Taira W, Kinjo S, Iwata M and Otaki JM, BMC Evolutionary Biology 2013, 13:168 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2148/13/168 http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2148-13-168.pdf)

8 – “Japan slips in press freedom index.” Toko Sekiguchi, Wall Street Journal: Japan Real Time, 13 February 2015. http://blogs.wsj.com/japanrealtime/2015/02/13/japan-slips-in-press-freedom-rankings/

9 – “Japan Olympic win boosts Abe but Fukushima shadows linger”, Elaine Lies, Reuters, 9 September 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-olympics-2020-japan-idUSBRE98806P20130909#ujqbOt12wDCbMa2v.97

10 – Tchertkoff W, Le crime de Tchernobyl: le goulag nucleaire.  Actes Sud (2006)

11 – Collective IndependentWHO, Proceedings of the Scientific and Citizen Forum on the Genetic Effects of Ionising Radiation, (2015) http://independentwho.org/media/Documents_Autres/Proceedings_forum_IW_november2014_English_02.pdf

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For 55 years, as of May 29, 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) has been under the heel of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in matters regarding ionizing radiation and health. The IAEA, whose mandate is the promotion of everything nuclear, has thus prevented the WHO from carrying out its public health mandate in a world more and more exposed to the lethal effects of ionizing radiation.

By Robert James Parsons, Truthout | Report – Thursday, 29 May 2014

“Read or Download the report”

Published in ISIS – 24 September 2014
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/Tokyo_contaminated_and_not_fit_for_habitation.php

In July 2014 Dr Shigeru Mita wrote a letter to his fellow doctors to explain his decision to move his practice from Tokyo to Okayama city in the West of Japan [1]. In it, he appeals to their sense of duty to answer the anxieties of parents in Japan who do not believe the information coming from the authorities. He says “I must state that the policies of the WHO, the IAEA or the Japanese government cannot be trusted.” and “if the power to save our citizens and future generations exists somewhere, it does not lie within the government or any academic association, but in the hands of individual clinical doctors ourselves.”

Mita claims that all 23 districts of Tokyo are contaminated, with the eastern area worst affected – up to 4 000 Bq/kg. (The becquerel is a unit of radioactivity. One Bq is the activity of a quantity of radioactive material in which one nucleus decays per second). These findings confirm what the nuclear physicist Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Nuclear Education found in 2012, when he picked up five random soil samples in Tokyo from between paving stones, in parks and playgrounds. The levels of contamination were up to 7 000 Bq/kg ; in the US, anything registering these levels would be considered nuclear waste [2].

While practising in Tokyo, Mita also discovered changes in the white blood cells of children under 10.

Independent science & independent reporting in Japan outlawed
In December 2013, the Japanese parliament passed a bill whereby public officials and private citizens could face ten years in prison for divulging “special state secrets”, and journalists, five years, for seeking to obtain classified information. The bill is widely interpreted as a way of preventing sensitive information about Fukushima (among other topics) reaching the Japanese public and by extension the rest of the world [3].

The independent organisation Reporters without Borders has downgraded Japan in its world press freedom index from 22nd place in 2012, to 53rd in 2013 and to 59th in 2014, following the passing of the state secrets bill. Reporters without Borders say that Japan“has been affected by a lack of transparency and almost zero respect for access to information on subjects directly or indirectly related to Fukushima” [4].

Nuclear lobby put in charge
Back in December 2012, the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) whose mission is to promote the peaceful uses of the atom, signed agreements with Fukushima Prefecture, Fukushima Medical University and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. These “Practical Arrangements” have in effect, handed over the management of the post-accident situation at Fukushima and its health consequences to the nuclear lobby. Among other clauses regarding cooperation and funding, we read that “The Parties will ensure the confidentiality of information classified by the other Party as restricted or confidential” [5].

But this should come as no surprise. Anyone who doubts the heavy hand of the nuclear lobby in the “management” (i.e. minimisation) of nuclear accidents should read the account by the physicist Bella Belbéoch entitled “Western responsibility regarding the health consequences of the Chernobyl catastrophe in Belarus, the Ukraine and Russia” [6]. The initial Soviet cover up of the accident is well known. Less well known are the “stages of submission” in which the IAEA forced the Soviets to accede to their demands to minimise estimates of the health effects of the accident. In a series of manipulations and bullying tactics, they forced the Soviet officials to divide their estimates of the health effects by a factor of 10. One Soviet delegate, Legassov, committed suicide, a few days after he capitulated to the IAEA demands, on the 26th April 1988, the second anniversary of the Chernobyl accident.

A travesty of reporting on risks and cancers
How has the nuclear lobby reacted to Fukushima ?  A preliminary assessment published in 2012 by the World Health Organisation (but actually emanating from the IAEA) managed to draw optimistic conclusions, while ignoring two critical groups, the workers at the TEPCO plant, and the people who were evacuated from the immediate area (See [7]  WHO Report on Fukushima a Travesty  SiS 55).   Then in 2013, the UNSCEAR report [8] described the risks of people developing thyroid cancer, leukaemia and breast cancer as barely discernible, even though the rates of childhood thyroid cancer in Fukushima prefecture are already 40 times what would be expected [9]. The UNSCEAR report has been criticised by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War because it consistently underestimates the radiation dose received, underestimates internal radiation, ignores the vulnerability of the human embryo to radiation, ignores hereditary effects, ignores the unreliability of the dose received by workers at the stricken plant, and only considers some cancers as potential health effects, whereas the experience of Chernobyl shows that every vital organ and system of the body is affected [10].

Raising the ‘safe’ limit of radiation
The Japanese people are faced with a government whose response to the dangers of the radiation was to increase the acceptable limit from 1 mSv/year to 20 mSv/year and who are now encouraging people to move back into areas that had previously been evacuated. (The millisievert is a unit of radiation dose. Before the Fukushima accident, Japan, like the rest of the world, respected the limit of 1 mSv/year recommended by the International Commission on Radiological Protection – ICRP). Meanwhile, the nuclear lobby wants to see the resumption of nuclear power in Japan as quickly as possible. This is not an atmosphere in which doctors are encouraged to report health effects that could be the result of radiation, and certainly not in Tokyo, whose residents have been led to believe that they have nothing to fear.

Changes in white blood cells in children
Mita began work as a general practitioner in Tokyo in the 1990s. In the letter to his colleagues explaining his decision to move his practice from Tokyo to Okayama City, he claims that contamination in the eastern part of Tokyo is 1000-4000 Bq/kg and in the western part, 300-1000Bq/kg. He compares these levels with Kiev, in Ukraine, after the accident at Chernobyl, of 500 Bq/kg, and with measurements taken before the 2011 Fukushima accident at Shinjuku, the site of the Tokyo municipal government of 0.5 – 1.5 Bq/kg. He says that “Tokyo should no longer be inhabited, and that those who insist on living in Tokyo must take regular breaks in safer areas”.

Mita conducts thyroid ultrasound tests for parents who are concerned about the health of their children but he is now concerned about the results of another test on children under 10, the differential white blood cell count. This test is undergone routinely by workers in the nuclear industry who are exposed to radiation. Blood is produced in bone marrow, which is one of the organs most vulnerable to radiation. The white blood cells consist of five different kinds of cells, neutrophils, lymphocytes, eosinocytes, basophils and monocytes, and it is the relative numbers of these five cell types that is examined. Mita has found a decline in neutrophils in children under 10, in areas that are not considered to be highly contaminated or even contaminated at all. His patients come from Northern Kanto, the area around Tokyo and including Tokyo itself [11].

“The pediatricians general textbook says that the reference value of neutrophils for healthy children (6-12 years old) is between 3000 and 5000. 3000 is considered as the threshold value.” Mita says. “But the mean value of neutrophils of the children who have visited our clinics since the accident has decreased to 2500. … It is lower than the threshold value of 3000. I think this points at a serious problem.”

Mita explains that although the decrease in neutrophil does not directly cause lowered immunity, it is “the last bastion of the immunity system” and could play a role in fatal illnesses such as septicaemia in the case of aggressive colds. “In the summer of 2011, there were many children with bloodshot eyes; and what we saw most were children with dark circles under the eyes. We also had increased occurrence of sinusitis. Previously, these patients got better soon after they were given proper treatment; however, we are seeing more cases of sinusitis accompanied with mild case of asthma continuing for longer periods. And when these children spend some time in the West, they get better.If at all possible, I would like them to move away from East Japan.”

In adults, he has found increased nosebleeds, hair loss, lack of energy, subcutaneous bleeding, visible urinary haemorrhage, skin inflammation, and coughs. He has found an increase in infectious diseases such as influenza, hand, foot and mouth diseases and shingles. “We also see more patients with diseases that had been rare before; for example, polymyalgia rheumatica is a disease common among those above age 50 and contracted by 1.7 people out of every 100,000. Before 3.11, [the date of the accident at Fukushima] we had one or less patient per year. Now, we treat more than 10 patients at the same time.” Dr Mita wonders “Could these be the same symptoms of muscle rheumatism that were recorded in Chernobyl ?”

Finally, Mita says that the radioactive contamination of Tokyo is increasing because of the Japanese government’s policy of transporting radioactive waste from the Fukushima zone all over Japan for incineration or burial. The Japanese government and the nuclear authorities claimed that filters on the stacks of the incineration plants would remove most of the radioactivity, but this is not the case, and in the opinion of many, it is adding to the contamination. Arnie Gundersen, for instance says, “They are creating 100 to 1000 times more radioactive material by burning debris than keeping it in concentrated form” [12].

To conclude
Mita is talking about his perceptions of the changes in health of a population living in an area that is not considered contaminated. It will be all too easy to dismiss his findings. He himself is not optimistic. He acknowledges that to prove any of his suspicions would require teams of doctors, and expensive research projects to compare groups of people, their radioactive contamination and the illnesses from which they suffer. That’s something simply beyond the reach of any single physician. In other words, “it’s impossible under the present state to collect the kind of data that would be printed in a prestigious science magazine. Still, as long as I know that something strange is clearly happening, I can’t just sit here doing nothing.”

And here is Professor Yablokov talking about the difficulties that doctors and scientists experienced in the Chernobyl territories, to prove a correlation between radiation and illness [13]: “The demand by IAEA and WHO experts to require “significant correlation” between the imprecisely calculated levels of individual radiation […] and precisely diagnosed illnesses […] is not, in our view, scientifically valid. […]We believe it is scientifically incorrect to reject data generated by many thousands of scientists, doctors and other experts who directly observed the suffering of millions affected by radioactive fallout in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia, as “mismatching scientific protocols.” It is scientifically valid to find ways to abstract the valuable information from these data.” Yablokov goes on to list the ways in which this could be done.

But it was not done in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia, and, in this way, the true health consequences of the Chernobyl accident remain hidden. The 2 million people, including 500,000 children still living in the worst contaminated areas around Chernobyl suffer a myriad of illnesses. (According to the Ministry of Health and Sciences in Belarus in 2000, 85% of the children in the contaminated areas were ill, whereas that figure was 15% before the accident in 1986 [14].)

Mita has made a brave decision. The pressure on health professionals and other citizens in Japan to remain silent about the health consequences of Fukushima, will lead to a health catastrophe there – not now, but in the decades to come.

For more on Fukushima and Chernobyl see [15] Truth about Fukushima and other articles in the series (SiS 55) and [16] Fukushima Crisis Goes Global (SiS 61).

References
01 – World Network for Saving Children from Radiation (2014). A Tokyo doctor who has moved to western Japan urges fellow doctors to promote radiation protection: A message from Dr Mita to his colleagues in Kodaira, Tokyo. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://www.save-children-from-radiation.org/2014/07/16/a-tokyo-doctor-who-has-moved-to-western-japan-urges-fellow-doctors-to-promote-radiation-protection-a-message-from-dr-mita-to-his-colleagues-in-kodaira-city-t/
02 – ENENews (2012). Gunderson: Tokyo soil so hot it should be sent to nuclear waste dump – Really severe releases hit city. Accessed 25 August 2014,  http://enenews.com/gundersen-tokyo-soil-hot-be-shipped-radioactive-dump
03 – “Japan whistleblowers face crackdown under proposed state secrets law.” Justin McMurray, Guardian, 5 December 2013. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/05/whistleblowers-japan-crackdown-state-secrets
04 – Reporters without Borders (2013). Press freedom index 2013: Dashed hopes after spring. Accessed 25 August 2014,  http://en.rsf.org/press-freedom-index-2013,1054.html
05 – Practical Arrangements between Fukushima Medical University and the International Atomic Energy Agency on Cooperation in the Area of Human Health. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/energy/fukushima_2012/pdfs/fukushima_iaea_en_06.pdf
06 – Belbéoch B. Responsabilités occidentales dans les conséquences sanitaires de la catastrophe de Tchernobyl, en Bélorussie, Ukraine et Russie. In Radioprotection et Droit nucléaire (eds. I Rens, J Jakubec, E George). Collection SEBES, 1998. English translation: Western responsibility regarding the health consequences of the Chernobyl catastrophe in Belarus, the Ukraine and Russia. http://www.dissident-media.org/infonucleaire/western_responsability.html 25/8/14
07 – Greaves S.  WHO report on Fukushima a travesty. Science in Society 55 2012, 38-39.
08 – United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. Sources, Effects and Risks of Ionizing Radiation. United Nations, New York, 2014. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://www.unscear.org/docs/reports/2013/13-85418_Report_2013_Annex_A.pdf
09 – Wasserman H. Fukushima, the continuing catastrophe.  The Ecologist, June 2014.http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2433355/fukushima_the_continuing_catastrophe.html
10 – Physicians for Social Responsibility USA et al. Critical Analysis of the UNSCEAR Report “Levels and effects of radiation exposure due to the nuclear accident after the 2011 Great East-Japan Earthquake and tsunami.” International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). Berlin, 2014. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://ippnw-students.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/UNSCEAR-Critique.pdf
11 – World Network for Saving Children from Radiation. Dr Shigeru Mita addresses the need of blood examination among children in the Kanto area. 2013. Accessed 25 August 2014, http://www.save-children-from-radiation.org/2013/11/11/title-dr-shigeru-mita-addresses-the-need-of-blood-examination-among-children-in-the-kanto-area/
12 – “Radioactive rubble reaction to haven in Japan.” Arnie Gundersen, Youtube.  Accessed 25 August 2014,   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIr-QcsjKxE
13 – Yablokov AV, Nesterenko VB and Nesterenko AV. Consequences of the Chernobyl catastrophe for public health and the environment 23 years later. Proceedings of the New York Academy of Sciences 1181, 2009, 318-326.
14 – UN Human Rights Council. Seventh session. Point 3. A/HRC/7/NGO/33 22 February 2008.
15 – Ho MW. Truth about Fukushima. Science in Society 55 2012,18-23.
16 – Ho MW. Fukushima crisis goes global. Science in Society 61 2014, 4-9.

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• The Guardian – Daily newspaper – England – 13 October 2013
  “How the World Health Organisation covered up Iraq’s nuclear nightmare” – Nafeez Ahmed

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♦

It began on April 26, 2007, the 21st anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. Five days a week for the past 7 years, from 8am until 6pm, a person stands silently outside WHO

“Offline: The day Bill Gates crossed the road”

or on “The Lancet” website

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In his report, Grover describes the extent of the disaster :

“The amount of radioactive cesium (137C) released due to the nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Plant is estimated to be 168 times higher than that released by the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. According to TEPCO, the accident released 900 petabecquerel of radioactive iodine and cesium…. Other radioactive materials released due to the nuclear accident include radioactive Tellurium (129mTe, 129Te), Silver (110mAg), Lanthanum (140La) and Barium (140Ba).”

The Rapporteur also argues strongly that the old methods of masking the stark reality of radiation exposure used by Soviet authorities after Chernobyl should no longer be acceptable. In the years since Chernobyl, we have learned much more about health damage due to radiation exposure including chromosomal aberrations, increased childhood and adult morbidity, impairment and leukemia. According to Grover, the scientific record demonstrating the link between long term exposure and radiation at low doses and the development of cancers can no longer be dismissed as insignificant. [For more information on the controversy concerning Chernobyl studies and the gaps in scientific knowledge about the health effects of radiation, see Matthew Penney and Mark Selden, What Price the Fukushima Meltdown? Comparing Chernobyl and Fukushima]

In the Japanese case, Grover criticizes the lack of effective distribution of stable iodine tablets to the population. He also questions the health protection system for nuclear workers: access to medical examination is not systematic (contrary to law) and the results of the examinations which are carried out are not adequately transmitted to the authorities. Finally, the labour force employed by subcontractors, a large majority of those working at Fukushima Daiichi, does not have a guarantee of access to such screenings. [For more information on the problems faced by workers at the Fukushima Daiichi site, see Gabrielle Hecht, Nuclear Janitors: Contract Workers at the Fukushima Reactors and Beyond]

The right to health is not respected

Concerning the zoning system around the nuclear plant, Grover reminds us of the unacceptability threshold decided for Chernobyl in 1991: any higher than 1 mSv per year and the population was not allowed to return and live and work in contaminated areas. In Fukushima this threshold has been set at the level of 20 mSv per year. In areas with radiation measured at rates between 20 and 50 mSv, the population can freely access the contaminated areas during the day.

The Rapporteur criticizes the use of “cost-benefit analysis” made by the Japanese authorities (following the ICRP recommendations) since such analysis does not respect the fundamental right to health of individuals. Grover argues that “collective interests” should never dominate individual rights, notably the right to health. Thus, he calls on the Japanese government to lower the threshold of exposure under which individuals are allowed to return to contaminated areas, and urges that displaced people receive compensation and free health protection in areas exceeding 1 msv per year.

On the matter of education about radiation, Grover asks the Japanese government to stop all claims in a supplementary reader provided to schools that radiation exposure below 100 mSv per year is not harmful to a person’s health. [For details on the 100 mSv claim in the classroom, see coverage in Kinyobi]

About decontamination, the Rapporteur expresses regret that no clear schedule to bring to contamination levels under 1 mSv has been set by the authorities beyond 2013. To clean school yards is not enough and Grover argues that it is instead necessary to decontaminate more broadly, taking into consideration the multiple “hot-spots” existing in areas which average under 20 mSv. For some of these zones, the population is now being called upon to return to their homes and communities. Finally, he criticizes the policy of involvement of the population in decontamination operations without providing them with proper equipment and informing them clearly of the health consequences.

The Rapporteur also criticizes the financing by the state, which means Japan’s taxpayers, of damages for which TEPCO is responsible: an amount equivalent to 110 billion euros or approximately 145 billion USD, announced at the end of 2012. [For more information on the financial risks of nuclear power that are borne by taxpayers and not by the companies and shareholders that stand to profit, see the Asia-Pacific Journal Feature, The Costs of Fukushima]

For the Japanese government, no “truth” except the views of WHO and UNSCEAR experts

At the same conference in Geneva at which Grover’s report was released, the Japanese government presented a counter report dated May 27, that dismisses Grover’s conclusions. According to Japanese authorities the “scientific basis” of Grover’s report is totally lacking. The “scientific basis” that the Japanese government relies on instead is the basis provided by WHO, UNSCEAR, ICRP and IAEA experts. Many scientists and nuclear critics disagree with these positions and others argue that ties to the nuclear industry and the dual role of assessing nuclear safety and promoting the use of nuclear power make the conclusions put forward by these organizations questionable.

The truth made available by UNSCEAR’s experts is a convenient one for the Japanese government: this UN agency in charge of estimating the consequences of the Fukushima meltdowns, is the same one that concluded that there were fewer than 50 immediate deaths due to radiation and under 15 deaths linked to thyroid cancers after the Chernobyl disaster, and is already anticipating “zero deaths” in the short as well as in the long term in Fukushima. This “anticipation” dates from March 2012 and was confirmed in their recent report.

Grover’s call for better protection of the population is considered by the Japanese government to be totally misplaced and redundant since nothing “scientifically” proves that the concerned populations have a real need to be protected beyond measures already being enforced: “The Government will continue to work on measures so that suitable support will be provided to the people who truly need it.”

When Grover recommended that the Japanese government “avoid limiting health check-ups for children to thyroid checks and extend check-ups for all possible health effects, including urine and blood tests”, the answer provided by the Japanese government, which is now asking that those passages be erased, is as follows:

“Intervention trials should be done scientifically and ethically. Why is blood testing or urine testing required? Because of the possibility of what type of disorder is such testing justified? The idea is unacceptable because, we should not unnecessarily burden the local citizens by forcing medically unjustified examinations on them.”

The 1 mSv per year threshold and “prejudgment” of health impacts

The Special Rapporteur recommended that the Japanese government: “… provide funding for relocation, housing, employment, education and other essential support needed by those who chose to evacuate, stay or return to any area where radiation exceeds 1mSv/year.” The Japanese government has responded with: “The sentences described above should be deleted because they are based on prejudgment. As we have already noted, there has been international controversy over the radiation level which affects health and it is still under much consideration from various perspectives.”

Concerning contaminated waste, Grover’s report notes: “As the contaminated waste is stored in residential areas and under playgrounds, thereby posing a health hazard to residents, establishing temporary storage facilities away from residential areas is urgently required.”

The Japanese authorities do not hesitate to openly lie while replying to this criticism: “When soil, etc. is stored, measures to prevent human health impacts are taken such as radiation shielding. Therefore, the description ‘posing a health hazard to residents’ is not the case.”

The Japanese government is revising history. It has been helped in this task by the French president, seven high-level ministers, and other Parliament members and industrial representatives during the state visit to Japan from 6 to 8 of June. The delivery of the 10 tons of MOX fuel which left La Hague on April 17, will also help the Japanese government to reopen nuclear power plants.

Thierry Ribault
Researcher at CNRS
June 10, 2013 in http://japanfocus.org/

 WHO’s health risk assessment of Fukushima – a travesty

Within days of the Fukushima nuclear accident and on the basis of no information whatsoever, WHO stated that “at the moment there is very little public health risk outside the 30 km (evacuation) zone”. In contrast, independent researchers (2) stated – on the basis of the composition of the emissions – that core meltdowns had occurred with massive radioactive contamination. They were right of course as TEPCO and the Japanese government conceded a few weeks later – too late to avoid harm.

Two years on, despite the availability of huge quantities of information, the WHO has issued no corrective to its initial statements. On the contrary, it has just published its “Health Risk Assessment”(3) which denies any health consequences with the exception of a slightly higher risk of developing certain cancers in populations in the worst affected areas.

The report bases its conclusions on “Preliminary Dose Estimations”(4) published by WHO but written by “experts” from the IAEA, UNSCEAR and national nuclear authorities, in other words, the nuclear lobby. The Estimations blithely report levels of radioactivity in Fukushima Prefecture of over 1 – 10 mSv and even 10-50 mSv without commenting on the fact that these are 10 to 50 times higher than the limit (1mSv/year) set by the International Commission on Radiation Protection (ICRP).

No international health authority on radiation and health

In May 2011, Rémy Pagani, Mayor of Geneva, told Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization (5) that if her organization continued in its current subservient role with the International Atomic Energy Agency, part of whose mandate is to promote use of the atom, it would be completed discredited.

Despite wide recognition of its unhealthy links with the nuclear lobby, WHO continues its criminal complicity in covering up the health consequences of nuclear activities. Today WHO’s abdication of responsibility in the area of radiation and health is complete – as is its discredit.

In December 2012, UNSCEAR’s chairman, Wolfgang Weiss claimed (6) that “no radiation effects had been observed in Japan among the public, workers or children in the area of the Fukushima-Daichi nuclear power plant.” This statement is inaccurate and grossly misleading. Firstly, a colossal 35% of children in Fukushima have already developed cysts and nodules on the thyroid gland. Thyroid abnormalities are early manifestations of serious health consequences as we know from Chernobyl. Secondly, given the ten to twenty year latency period for radiation related illness, particularly cancers, it is meaningless to report on what is currently being observed. However misleading they are, such statements provide false reassurance to governments and the public.

Cancer risk 20 times higher than international “acceptable” level

CRIIRAD (7) reports soil contamination in the Planned Evacuation Zones (outside the 20 km circle) that implies exposures exceeding 20 mSv/year (8). This corresponds to a risk of cancer that is 20 times higher than the level that is judged “acceptable” by the ICRP. Hundreds of thousands of people have been exposed to unacceptable levels of radiation in 2012, as they were in 2011.

In a letter to the Special Rapporteur, ACSIR (9) reports terrifying levels of radioactivity in Fukushima, Koriyama and Date – towns situated in areas designated as Safe Zones! In Date, Dr Nesterenko of the Belrad Institute found 88 mSv/year and 237 MSv/year – equivalent to the exclusion zone in 1991 in Ukraine.

The Fukushima Centre for Agricultural Technology reported an increase in the radioactivity of vegetables over six days from 0 Bq/kg to 3421 Bq/kg in just six days’ exposure to dust in the air. (10) This provides an indication of the contamination to which children in the local school are being subjected.

Criminal negligence

The initial comments (11) made by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, Mr Anand Grover, after his visit to Japan, confirm that the government has been willfully and perhaps criminally negligent in failing to protect the population from radioactive contamination.

Grover notes for example that the government :

• neither provided instructions nor distributed stable iodine to the affected population;

• did not make public essential information from SPEEDI which would have ensured safe evacuation;

• used a dose of 20 mSv/year to determine evacuation areas, which is 20 times the international standard;

• installed radiation monitoring stations that give artificially low readings;

• is conducting a health survey that is too narrow and ignores evidence that cancer and other diseases do occur in relation to internal, low dose radiation below 100 mSv;

• is denying access to the medical records of children with thyroid abnormalities.

A cover up will not be possible this time

In a previous meeting, Dr Chan specifically requested that IW provide her with independent information from alternative networks. With this in mind, IndependentWHO has requested that Dr Chan, Director-General, WHO, organize a meeting with Japanese citizen associations, in the presence of Anand Grover, Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, before the next World Health Assembly in May 2013.

Given WHO’s total abdication of responsibility in radiation and health, it does not much matter whether Dr Chan listens either to citizens or the Special Rapporteur. The truth will out. The Japanese people have denounced official lies and disinformation since the first weeks of the catastrophe and will continue to do so over the next decades. In ten to twenty years, the tragedy of the continuing health catastrophe will be there for all to see.

 Alison Katz

Le Courrier – Daily newspaper – Geneva – 25th of March 2013

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1 – UN Special Rapporteur’s Press Statement. County Visit to Japan, 15­26 November 2012.

2 – Such as Fairewinds

3 – Health Risk Assessment from the nuclear accident after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. WHO, 2013.

4 – Preliminary dose estimations from the nuclear accident after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. WHO, 2012.

5 – During a meeting with IndependentWHO

6 – Weiss, Wolfgang. Preparing a scientific report to the General Assembly on exposures due to nuclear accident following the Great East Japan earthquake and tsunami. J. Radiol. Prot. 32 N113.

7 – Commission de Recherche et d’Information Indépendantes sur la Radioactivité. Communiqué de Presse 5 et 11 décembre, 2012

8 – 1 mSv/year is the permissible dose for adults set by the ICRP

9 – Association of Citizens and Scientists Concerned about Internal Radiation, letter dated 8 November 2012

10 – Fukushima Institute of Agricultural Technology

11 - http://www.simplyinfo.org/?p=8403

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