Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Radiation Detection For Tokyo Resident?
An anonymous reader writes "I'm an American who is living in Tokyo. Stories have started popping up about 'radiation hot spots' in Tokyo and surrounding prefectures so I have begun to worry. I live on the first floor of my apartment building and right by our washing machine there is a gutter out there that is clogged with rain water and mud, which has me especially worried because my wife and I are planning to have kids soon. Obviously no one from the government is going to come by to check our gutter so I feel the need to take matters into my own hands. I have absolutely no idea so I'm asking you guys. What kind of radiation detector should I get? A Geiger Counter? If it measures Gamma rays is that enough? Are alpha and beta dangerous too? I know no one has all the answers regarding radiation but any advice you guys could give me would be great."
...Believe it or not radiation is a complex and not at all obvious thing. Most people haven't studied it in any significant fashion, in a university or otherwise. In the same way a doctor would never encourage someone to self diagnose, I would never encourage someone to measure radioactive exposure by themseves. It would be irresponsible for me to do so ...
I think we have to view the question in the context of this poster is living in Japan and the Japanese government can not be trusted to give out accurate and trust worthy information.
To put it in your analogy the town doctor is saying everything is fine but the doctor is being payed by the company that is polluting the town.
So what this poster is really asking is how does he go about protecting his family from radiation exposure from the Fukoshima disaster ?.