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Fukushima vs. Calpol (letter to my mother)

Dear Mum

Thank you for calling earlier this evening. I'm very sorry that the BBC news reports from Fukushima, combined with our presence in Japan, have caused you so much concern. Please don't think that I am dismissive of the risks when I try to put things in perspective. I am worried too, but then, where the children are concerned, I worry about everything! I only know that...



  • (i) some things tend to look worse when you are further away, just as N.Ireland from 1969-1989 (for almost all my childhood, and early adulthood) seemed to be a total war zone from the perspective of London, or Los Angeles—yet we did not flee, even though the statistical risks to the population were so much greater than the risks posed by Fukushima to the population of Kobe;
  • (ii) even a few months after the dropping of real bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, it seems that people who had not been exposed to the initial blast lived healthy lives in the area and bore children with no greater risk of cancer than anywhere else on the planet—and that's before considering lifestyle choices, such as the Western diet. (I don't doubt the Ulster Fry and Players killed many more people than the IRA and UDA put together, and they never signed up to any Peace agreement); 
  • (iii) even the BBC website which carries the news story that so alarms you points out that "There have been no fatalities resulting from the leaks at Fukushima, and risks to human health are thought to be low."; 
  • (iv), at some point, as my friend Zlatko pointed out to me, we have to trust what scientists say, and there is uniform consensus that, at the moment, this far from Fukushima, the risks to health from escaping airborne radiation and/or food contamination are negligible. (Contrast that, for a moment, with the scientific consensus on children's Calpol, a product that  I tried to obtain in Japan two days ago, only to find that it is banned here—also in the US, Norway and several other countries—because the colouring used in the medicine (Carmoisine E122) is a suspected carcinogen. Yet in the UK we can walk into Tesco, and freely buy this potential poison, to help our children, without any warning of the potential danger. Surely the risks are low, but that is, in a way, just the point....
Tonight, as I watch Justin wheezing through his first viral infection since he was born, I ask myself which is the more serious health hazard: the fact of my having brought him here, or the strong possibility that, had we stayed in Sheffield, I would have dosed him up with Calpol to lower his temperature. Medical science suggest he's better off in Kobe (though I wish I could make him feel better overnight).

So, please don't worry about us, or—if you must, just as I must worry about my children—at least direct that concern to the real risks we face: of crossing the road on the way to school, of not washing hands before preparing food; of not paying due attention when walking down the stairs; of drinking, or not drinking (!) that unit of alcohol—me, not the kids!; of driving up and down the hill.)

As they say in Japanese, shinpai shinai de kudasai! (Please don't worry!)

Much love

Nigel

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