“Fear of radiation” is frightening

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The world’s two worst industrial disasters occurred in the early years of my career in radiation physics. The Bhopal gas tragedy was the worst industrial accident and occurred on the night of December 2–3, 1984 at the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India and killed 10,000 people on that one night. The worst ever nuclear accident occurred at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine on 26 April 1986, which led to less than 60 fatalities within 3 months of the accident. These two catastrophic events helped me shape my perception of the risks associated with modern industrial processes. While many have forgotten the Bhopal gas tragedy, the Chernobyl disaster is still fresh in our collective memory. Last year was the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal gas tragedy and I asked my medical radiation students if they had heard of this event. Not a single student out of the 80 in the class had heard of or read about this event. However, more than a handful of students had heard or read about the Chernobyl disaster. The students were shocked to hear that for every one person killed in the immediate aftermath of Chernobyl one hundred more fatalities were recorded in Bhopal. I often wonder why our perception of the risk associated with ionising radiation is so heavily skewed. Who is responsible for this public anxiety? Is it the media, politicians or scientists? I think the burden of responsibility falls equally on all three sections of society. If our perception of the risk is not balanced, we are predisposed to making incorrect judgments. Such decisions are invariably costly and often lead to exposure to the unknown and perhaps more significant risk elements. After more than 100 years of research, the risk radiation poses to humans is still poorly understood at ‘low dose’ level. Most people regard a dose less than 100 mSv as low dose. Public fear of radiation began to develop after the dropping of the A-bombs on Japan during WW2. The fear has been propagated by the blatant lies of the anti-nuclear campaigners and was and is still supported by the mass media seeking sensationalist stories. The saying ‘Never let a fact get in the way of a good story’ unfortunately holds very true when applied to events involving ionising radiation. It is nearly impossible for a scientist to get anything in the mass media that contradicts the prevailing falsehoods. My own experience illustrates that even professional radiation physicists are not spared from radiation phobia. On one occasion I was working near the door of a high dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy room, where the dose rate out of the shielding container is typically 5 lSv/h. My colleague, a physicist, insisted that I move away from that area as they considered the area to be characterized by a ‘high radiation level’. I obliged, as at the time, it was easier than to explain why it was safe for me to work there. I was M. Bhat (&) Adelaide Radiotherapy Centre, Adelaide, SA, Australia e-mail: mbhat@adradcentre.com.au