Re: Iodine tablets

[dumbo]

I am getting a little concerned about the nuclear problem in japan. If there is a major nuclear meltdown and winds start blowing west, I am not 100% sure Chinese government will be ready for a disaster like this. I want my wife to buy some iodine tablets in Beijing just in case. Does anyone if these are easily available in China and what they are called in Chinese? Thanks

[Jan]

I am no math genious. But with common sense and knowledge.

I am confident that the radioactive particles will never reach China. It would take one hell of a wind blowing in 1 direction for a long time. And even then, because of the distance. It would be minimal. I think the normal pollution from China is 10x worse than the radiation from Japan, that unlikely hits China.

Also pre-emtively eating iodine will not help. Instead it can even do some harm. Only if taken at the right time, what I read, 30 minutes before the radiation reaches your area. It will have 0 effect if taken afterwards or too early.

Also iodium only helps with thyroid gland. It will not protect in any other way, you will still be exposed to radiation. Which will increase the chance of you getting cancer and other nasty things. Best way to protect yourself from it, is to stay inside. In a non ventilated space.

Any way. People at Finland are buying and eating iodium because things happened at Japan. Because of the hysteria that media spreads about that. And because of their prejudices from Hollywood... It will have 0 effect on Finnish atmosphere. Too far away.

I think only the cities closeby cities the nuclear power plant should do something extreme as my examples. But I'm sure that the Japanese and world experts know better than me. When to evactuate, and how to prepare for things like this.

[Vince G]

Don't worry, the media is making it much worse then it is. The cores are safeguarded. If the core exploded there would be just a mushroom cloud and no building left. 

I noticed when the tsunami happen they said the wave would be 4 foot hitting the US. Then it grew all the way to 8 foot? But here's what happen....

San Diego, CA (PRWEB) March 11, 2011

A Tsunami generated by an 8.9 earthquake in Japan is hitting the coast of California. Watch it unfold at UltimateBeachHouse.com’s live beach cam. The series of Tsunami waves began to hit San Diego beaches at 8:45 am and will be seen live for 10-12 hours.

According to new reports coming in from Japan, the Tsunami is generating a series of tidal surges. The first waves to hit San Diego happened at 8:45 am and measure only a foot or two. “The first thing we noticed was a lower than expected tide. The tide was about a foot or two lower than predicted by standard tidal charts. Then at 8:40am the water began to rise”

[David E]

Radio-active Iodine isotope (Iodine 131) will be released IF the core of the reactor is breached. It has a half-life of 8.3 days...ie after 8.3 days it has decayed to 50% of its potential and will continue to halve every 8.3 days thereafter. The decay process is where damage to cells occur, when free electrons act as "bullets" into adjacent cells.

Iodine is used by the Thyroid gland for effective functioning and thus is stored there. It is not desirable for the body to have a store of a radio-active isotope ticking away and doing damage. The use of supplemental Iodine as an anti-radiation medicine is recommended where exposure rates are high....ie core melt-downs and gross nuclear excursions (Chernobyl).

If the body is kept well supplied with natural Iodine (not the isotope) then it does not store the radioactive isotope. To ensure that high levels of Iodine are present in the body, make sure that the daily intake is sufficient...best achieved by using a little more SEA_SALT on your food than you normally would (Potassium and Sodium Iodide)....but dont overdo it, because it will damage kidneys and also affect blood-pressure !!!

However, if the core is breached then you will also ingest a lot of Plutionium 235...which has a half-life of 250,000 years...bit useless dosing with sea-salt in that case !!!

By any International Standards, the average Chinese person is living in a toxic, carcinogenic Chemical soup of pollution 24/7......and the sight of an oil refinery in Japan, on fire, belching hundreds, if not thousands of tons of poisonous crap into the atmosphere, that will produce a large pollution load over most of the Planet as it drifts on the wind and jet-streams everywhere,  does not seem to have interested anyone in the media yet ...most strange...

And we are seeing that "we cant put that fire out..so we will just let it burn itself out over the next few days/weeks".

But the slightest radiation leak of a very minor nature gets everybody terrified.....and predicting the end of life on Earth as we know it.

[Kiwi303]

The long term effects of Chernobyl on the UK, which got a dusting with radioactive particles due to winds, has been calculated as equal to smoking half a cigarette a year... China to Fukushima is not too far off the distance from the UK to Ukraine...

and the Japanese reactors have containment jackets, 6 inches of stainless surrounding the actual steam generation Pressure vessel, and inside the containment jacket, the bases are designed to catch and spread the melt in the case of a meltdown and hold it in a wide flat puddle with maximum surface area, so it can still be cooled before it eats through the base. The explosions only blew off the exterior sheds, nothing more than big raincoats to keep the weather off the machinery.

Chernobyl had no containment jacket, just the pressure vessel and the exterior weather cladding, when the hydrogen blew, just like with the japanese ones over the last few days, the blast blew open the pressure vessels and scattered the fuel around. The japanese ones just knocked out and scattered the weather cladding and left the pressure vessels safe inside their containment jackets...

I'm not worried about a chernobyl happening, I wouldn't like to be within a few Kms of the station in the open with the steam they are venting and the hydrogen bangs going off, but I'd happily be sitting inside a closed room in Tokyo eating sashimi.

[Jan]

http://mitnse.com/2011/03/13/why-i-am-not-worried-about-japans-nuclear-reactors/

Some good text. To ease all of your minds. The writer seems to know how things work.