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Richard Bramhall

This seems to imply that we're all cosily agreeing except for minor differences of opinion. This isn't the case. The Low Level Radiation Campaign has roundly criticised the Fairlie / Sumner report as unduly theoretical and highly selective. See http://www.llrc.org/health/subtopic/fairliechernobyl.htm
The point is that their apparently large numbers are derived from nitpicking over the "source term" (amount of radiation people were exposed to) which the nukes will cheerfully dicker about 'til Kingdom come because it can never be resolved. The risk factors they have applied to their version of the source term in order to calculate expected deaths are entirely conventional, and they have seriously under-reported the state of the scientific debate about radiation "dose"; so the nukes will be happy about that too. And, as Rob's Cardis quote says, even the upper estimate of 60,000 won't be visible against the background noise of spontaneous disease rates; yet another reason for the nukes to rejoice.
Fairlie and Sumner's reading list omits important and recent material though it includes stuff they admit is out of print and out of date! They also admit they haven't looked at evidence from the ex-Soviet Union territories. On the other hand the ECRR has gone to enormous trouble and expense to translate and synopsise hard evidence (250 pages of it). Let no-one think that the ECRR's reticence about making specific predictions as to numbers of dead bodies is a weakness or an indication that they're just arm-waving. Now that the concept of dose is seen to be inapplicable to the types of exposure involved in reactor disasters (as even ICRP has admitted), we must accept that dose-based calculations confer a merely spurious precision. We don't know what will happen. This is all a ghastly experiment. Let's make sure we learn the lessons.
Richard Bramhall, LLRC

Dr David Lowry

Rob

Truth will out.. with the aid of honest investigative reporters. Much appreciated. Keep sleuthing.

David

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