General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: What's happening at Fukushima? [View all]Sirveri
(4,517 posts)That's pretty basic radiation health physics. The Cesium has a biological half life of 5 years in population, and they have derived limits from these things. Further, there is no evidence that radiation has led to the starfish kill in the oceans, the much more likely culprit being global warming (once again caused by burning coal), which has increased global ocean acidity causing the starfish skeletal structure to become more frail and brittle. Further, this has happened once before, several decades prior to fukushima. Finally, we do not eat starfish in any significant manner, we do eat fish, and those fish are tested for harmful levels of multiple substances by the USDA and they would issue a health advisory warning to limit consumption if those limits are violated.
The fact that they have issued a consumption warning for fish means that the system works, and that they would likely also issue a warning if radioactive contamination exceeded government setpoints in fish.