Forbidden Science: Low Level Radiation and Cancer

American Thinker ^ | July 6, 2012 | Norman Rogers

[neverdem]

Forbidden Science: Low Level Radiation and Cancer

Fraudulent science isn't chat. It's a crime that needs prosecution!

[Ronin]

On Radon... in Japan, hot-springs advertise it.

No joke, there was a place around the corner (since converted to apartment buildings because traditional baths are dying of neglect) that offered a “refreshing radon spa”.

I was never tempted to try it while it was there, but it’s not uncommon. I’ve read about them in other places.

[103198]

Radiation hormesis theory is never addressed by regulators such as the Nuclear Regulatory Comission. From studying it, I accept it any day over AGW. The LNT radiation theory is deeply flawed and isn't supported by measurements of human or other biological populations.

Hormesis vs. LNT is another case of politics over science. One of it's adverse effects is to greatly increase the cost of nuclear power.

[SatinDoll]

One of my coworkers at the nuclear plant where I worked knew a fellow named Ernie.

Ernie (I can’t tell you his last name because it is still classified) lathed the uranium and plutonium used to make the only two atomic bombs used during a war. My coworker had met him while working at Hanford, WA.

Ernie would set off all the radiation alarms entering the Hanford reservation. This was due to an old injury. Back in 1945, while lathing plutonium, the lathe shattered. He wasn’t severely injured, but ended up with 200-300 milligrams of weapons grade plutonium embedded in his body.

My coworker stated that he met Ernie in the early 1970s. At that time Ernie was smoking cigars and drinking about a liter of whiskey a week.

Of course, it had to be the whiskey that was keeping him alive, don’t you think?

[noinfringers2]

I am reminded that years ago in the midwest,Iowa, there was a doctor named Dr.Norman Baker who was using radiation, I believe it was X-rays but could have been some other radiation, to kill cancer cells. He was run out of town and the Country for being a quack. The medical profession had much to do with his going. As I recall the Dr. set up his practice across the Rio Grande near Loraedo Texas. I don’t recall what went on as to his curing cancer but there were people who went for his treatment(s).

[donmeaker]

Radiation is routinely used to treat cancer. Cancer cells have less resistance to radiation than normal cells. The debate is whether it makes sense to accept the risk of radiation to healthy tissue. High level radiation certainly is associated with a cancer risk to healthy tissue. One could draw a straight line from that risk to zero-zero, and that is what is routinely done. The proponents of low level radiation assert that rather than use a straight line, they should draw their straight line to zero-less than zero, so some low level of radiation is associated with positive benefits for healthy tissue, rather than merely act as a treatment for small cancers that you don’t know about yet. I don’t know what a mechanism for such a health benefit would be.

[Fighter@heart]

I can for-see the T.S.A. using this as well as the airlines......”FREE cancer preventitive treatment prior to each flight!!”

[ronnie raygun]

Fraudulent science isn’t chat. It’s a crime that needs prosecution!

Add global warming scam to the list of prosecution

[mvpel]

The mechanism is theorized by some to be that the radiation stimulates the immune response, exercising and strengthening the mechanisms which manage the ordinary tissue damage that occurs every moment of every day due to oxidants, other natural metabolic waste products, and natural cell death.

[mountainlion]

My urologist said that radiation killed the weaker cancer cells without damaging the healthy cells with radiation treatment of prostate cancer. Many cancers are treated by radiation.

Miners used to collect a fee for people go into their mine and soak up the radon.

[aruanan]

Miners used to collect a fee for people go into their mine and soak up the radon.

Actually, this was not an old-timey practice since the concept of radiation hormesis is relatively new. There are some places where people can go into mines for exposure to low-level radiation. The easiest thing is just to live in a Western mountainous state.

See the following:

Observations on the Chernobul Disaster and LNT.

[BobL]

I’m sorry, I just don’t buy this article. It would make my life too ‘uncomfortable’. LOL.

[aruanan]

Bananas have a lot of radiation from potassium-40. A truckload of bananas will set off a radiation detector.

[aruanan]

The reason is, probably, that radiation in small or moderate quantities stimulates cellular repair mechanisms.

It also messes up some cancer cells that have defective DNA repair mechanisms.

[mountainlion]

The Chernobyl Disaster was man made by operator disabeling the safeties. The reactor was like a swimming pool with no containment. Modern reactors have massive containment and multi level safeties. It is almost impossible to release radiation making automatic cure of cancer impossible./s

[aruanan]

I am reminded that years ago in the midwest,Iowa, there was a doctor named Dr.Norman Baker who was using radiation, I believe it was X-rays but could have been some other radiation, to kill cancer cells.

It's standard practice to treat cancer using radiotherapy. It's not standard practice to claim to prevent cancer by subjecting patients to radiation. For one reason, it can be demonstrated that a targeted dose of radiation to certain tumors will cause them to shrink or regress. It cannot be demonstrated that exposing a particular individual to a whole body dose of radiation has prevented him from developing cancer. This is something that can be suggested epidemiologically by studies of cancer rates among populations living in areas of widely varying levels of background radiation, but not on a person by person basis. Treating Norman as a quack was the right thing to do if he wasn't a radiation oncologist.

[matthew fuller]

Very interesting!

[redgolum]

That much plutonium, and he should have been dead right there.

It doesn’t take much. But then I suspect it hasn’t been studied to closely.

[donmeaker]

That is a claim, not an explanation of how the effect works.

Ionizing radiation (sufficient energy to break covalent bonds) leads to odd chemicals inside the cells. The energy of ionizing radiation is absorbed in breaking the covalent bonds. If the bond is in DNA, then you can get a cancer, or you can get a mutation, which may be good, or may be bad, or may make no difference. If it is not in DNA, but in a tissue, you have miniscule tissue damage that is repaired. If it is in a chemical that is not tissue, you have an odd chemical in a dose that is too small to have any effect.

[donmeaker]

Plutonium 239 is an alpha particle emitter (helium nuclei)Your skin stops it. The major problem is breathing in plutonium dust, which affects the lungs, which tissues are sensitive to alpha particles, which can occur if you don’t follow safety procedures. Another difficulty is alpha emitters on things like cigarettes which are sucked into the lungs.