> Perhaps we'll find a mass grave somewhere full of radioactive bodies of dead workers but barring that, most data based consensus puts the total death toll from all radiation effects at less than 1,000 and usually less than 100.
The problem is that to this day we struggle to fully understand the effects of long-term low-level radiation exposure because figuring those out usually requires long-term epidemiological studies, which are expensive and complex [0]
Okay. I'm trying to understand the "low level radiation" part though. What is disappointing about the study you reference is that they don't characterize what the level of radiation is compared to normal background radiation, they don't account for changes in population or diet, and they don't account for changes in industry.
As the study itself states: "These conclusions are regrettable because low statistical significance only means that chance has not been excluded as an explanation, assuming no bias and no real effect. In more detail, p values -that is, the probabilities that observed effects may be due to chance - are affected by both the magnitude of the effect and the size of the study. This means the results of statistical tests must be interpreted with caution [26]."
Meta studies based on statistical analysis is inherently challenged. This one is no better (and no worse) than the others.
"Whatever the final explanation for the increases, the KiKK study and its implications raise many questions, including whether vulnerable people, such as pregnant women and women of child-bearing age, should be advised on possible risks of living near nuclear power stations."
and:
"It is recommended that US regulatory agencies should establish a KiKK-style epidemiological study of cancer incidences near all US nuclear power stations with precise distances being measured between cancer cases and nuclear reactors."
The point here is that our understanding of these impacts is obviously not as complete as many people like to pretend.
I don't disagree, and that same text is also in various meta studies about Cell phone towers causing cancer. And it is the problem in general with statistics based meta studies which where lampooned in XKCD[1] and lamented by the American Council on Science and Health[2]. The summary bit might be "These studies point to areas that should be looked at but offer neither hypothesis or prediction and thus not 'science' so much as they are an early investigative technique."
If nuclear plants caused childhood cancers, then they ALL would cause childhood cancers, so a scientific study would say "This mechanism, when present, has this effect. Here is our experiment to prove that, here are the results of the proof. We predict that if you look anywhere else where this mechanism is present you will see the same results."
If low level radiation did cause childhood leukemia then there would be clusters in Arvada Colorado and Moab Utah. But there aren't. So why not? When the science is done, and the other variables eliminated, to date there is no study that links low level ionizing radiation to any harmful effect on humans. Even using that term is difficult because there is alpha, beta, and gamma radiation based on electrons, protons, and neutrons. Only Gamma radiation has any sort of penetrating capability at all.
So without the science, this study means nothing. Now if they can follow up with core samples, air samples, water samples, and food products to see if there are any nuclear fission byproducts getting into the area around the plant that would be good science.
> there is no study that links low level ionizing radiation to any harmful effect on humans
This does not mean much. The direct destruction effect of strong radiation on cells is cumulative, the longer you're exposed, the greater harm done. Given the physics and biology knowledge, our best bet so far is that effect of weak but extraordinary radiation is cumulative as well. It will increase probability of cancer and leukaemia.
Alpha radiation is lethal too if you get its source into your body.
"The direct destruction effect of strong radiation on cells is cumulative, the longer you're exposed, the greater harm done."
This statement is not actually true in the general case, and that is part of the problem. It, like many others involving the effect of radiation on people, originated in the late 50's when there was little data and it was difficult to experiment. A great article on that is here (https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/03/11...) but in a nutshell, the more we learn about DNA the more we discover that having evolved in a "low level radiation" environment it does a really good job of completely repairing/eradicating the damage done by low to moderate levels of radiation.
That does not say you can't get more harm faster than your DNA can fix it, which clearly you can. But the level where the damage is "cumulative" (aka permanent) is much much higher than we previously estimated based on our limited data.
Given modern tissue engineering it is conceivable could could actually do some solid experimental work in the field with a tunable radiation source and a set of growing tissue samples. Nobody has done that yet that I can find (I don't have access to a wide variety of journals in Biology that I do in some of the other sciences) but if they are please post their research here.
You've got some points on regeneration, but notice I wrote strong radiation. For weak radiation the issue is complicated, the effects develop over decades. Of course LNT model is under legitimate suspicion due to regenerative capabilities but LNT model is just about probability of cancer. It does not take into account other effects of radiation. The survivors of Chernobyl suffer different harms, for example one interview I read recently reported one survivor of high doses having to go for regular skin transplants. The radiation health effects are complex and the whole issue is just far more complicated than the Forbes biased opinion piece claims (although it does make a good point of taking the immediate death toll in perspective).
It does in the context of places, like those mentioned above, with naturally elevated levels of background radiation. The absence of studies out of these areas with links to harmful health effects is evidence that such levels are likely safe.
Again, absence of evidence does not mean much. Nobody is expecting the workers to fall down after minutes of work there, the effects of low level radiation are subtle but given the known mechanism or damage there is no basis for calling such levels safe. Workers working with radioactive tailings may suffer harmful long-term effects. But it is hard to causally connect old age health issues with presence in these areas decades ago. You cannot conclude "likely safe" from absence of information or because the workers seem fine. You would have to do the studies, which as you say, probably were not made.
> The absence of studies out of these areas with links to harmful health effects is evidence that such levels are likely safe.
That's such an odd wording, making it sound like there's only an absence of studies showing harmful health effects. When in actuality there's an absence of studies, period.
That's why the commentary about the German KiKK study suggests also conducting such studies in the US. If those were already a thing, then there'd be no reason to suggest conducting them?
Not really; there’s always constant low level radiation exposure in our day to day from background radiation. It goes up tremendously when you eat a banana a day. It goes up another few orders of magnitude when you get on a plane. We’ve got a huge corpus of constantly irradiated people (flight attendants and pilots). We’ve got a pretty good idea of how this works.
You miss the point. Studies on low level radiation effects study, for example, deviations from the linear model, but are so far inconclusive, because it is hard to prescribe and control the level of radiation over such a long time. It could be done in lab, but who would subject themselves willingly to regular blasts of radiation? Radiation intensity in planes varies a lot, depending on the height, time of flight, geographical location, etc., so little can be inferred. It would take decades and lots of volunteers willing to get harmed in the name of science to do such studies reliably. Do you know of any such study?
The problem is that to this day we struggle to fully understand the effects of long-term low-level radiation exposure because figuring those out usually requires long-term epidemiological studies, which are expensive and complex [0]
[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2757021/