[cdn-nucl-l] Radiation and Cancer

[Randal Leavitt <randal.leavitt@rogers.com>]

OK - I have to ask:

1. Does radiation cause cancer?

I understand that radiation can cause sickness if the dose is high, and
this might be lethal.  But a lot of people seem to recover and live on
fairly well.  Are there any documented cases of radiation "causing"
cancer in people?

I read one report about radiation workers getting more cancer than the
average population, but they also lived longer than the average
population.  It seemed to me they were healthier than most and so lived
long enough to get cancer.  This is not bad news.

I guess some people got cancer when they worked with radium during
WWII.  Were these problems caused by the radiation, or by the chemical
nature of radium?

Everyone seems to "know" that radiation causes cancer.  I just want to
question this assumption.

-- 
Randal Leavitt ---------- gnupg public key: bbbad04d
http://positiveenergy.blogspot.com/
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