Radioactivity Found in Fish - Japan

Eating radioactive fish every day for a year doesn't even expose you as much radiation as you would get from the U.S Capitol.

Risk Low

The risk to people from the deliberate discharge at the Fukushima plant is low, according to the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency.

The potential additional radiation dose to a person eating seaweed or seafood caught near the Fukushima plant every day for a year would be 0.6 millisievert, the agency said in a statement. That compares to 0.85 millisievert from a year of exposure to granite that comprises the U.S. Capitol, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

With a radioactive half-life of 30 years, cesium can build up in the meat of marine predators as they eat smaller animals, said Karen Gaines, chairwoman of the biology department at the University of Eastern Illinois in Charleston.

“If they’re going to restart fisheries and make people feel comfortable, they’ll need real-time monitoring of the catch,” said Gaines, who studies radioactive cesium in animals at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, which made plutonium for U.S. nuclear weapons.


Source: BusinessWeek