Radiation danger Q & A: What you need to know
How radiation affects the body depends on the intensity, duration, and method of exposure. Keep clicking to get detailed answers to common - and potentially life-saving - questions.
Source: AP
How are people exposed to radiation?
Radioactive particles in fallout can be inhaled, fall on the skin or be ingested through contaminated food or water. The level can vary greatly even between short distances, said Dr. Fred Mettler, a University of New Mexico radiologist who led a study of health effects after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster."You can come around a corner and the dose rate can be very high, and you get back behind a column and the dose rate is much lower," depending on what type of particles are in the fallout, whether you're standing under a roof where they've accumulated or shielded you from them, etc., he said.
How does radiation harm?
In the short term, radiation damages rapidly dividing cells - hair, the stomach lining, bone marrow. That can cause nausea, vomiting, fatigue, loss of infection-fighting blood cells and clotting problems. Children are most at risk because they have so many rapidly dividing cells.One type of radiation, radioactive iodine, is taken up by the thyroid gland and can lead to thyroid cancer if pills are not taken right away to prevent this uptake. Long term, radiation can damage DNA and raise the risk of many types of cancer years down the road.