Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Now, #Radioactive Sanitary Napkins??

It's in the "rumor" stage - i.e. concerned citizens measuring the radiation themselves with their personal survey meters and exchanging information on Twitter (which is by the way extremely suited for the Japanese language because of kanji characters that pack a ton of info and are still considered one character).

Someone tested the "Unicharm" brand of feminine sanitary napkins, and the survey meter showed 0.15 microsievert/hr on a napkin. The ambient radiation level was 0.07 microsievert/hr (indoors).

He was worried for his wife, and traced the manufacturing number on the package, and it was made in the factory in Fukushima Prefecture. Seeing his twitter, someone else called the customer service of Unicharm, who confirmed that the napkin was made in their factory in Tanagura-machi in Higashi Shirakawa-gun (district), Fukushima Prefecture (福島県東白川郡棚倉町). The customer service person said yes they do a random testing of the napkins but no they haven't detected any radiation.

(Well, talk about ambient radiation in Fukushima. The air radiation level of Tanagura-machi is between 0.17 to 0.49 microsievert/hr outdoors, according to the Tanagura-machi website.)

Now, people are testing tampons, diapers for babies and adults, and baby wipes with their personal survey meters.

Radioactive cesium is said to affect reproductive organs. Probably another "rumor".

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

is it sad that nothing surprises me anymore? I just assume everything made in Japan as elevated levels of radioactivity.

Anonymous said...

I just knew today from Japanese person that there women, 4months pregnant in Tokyo who did abortion, because ultrasound was showing embrions without brain, and there are multiple such cases. I just want to know if it is real truth, if so ...means mutation process is already happens and it is all covered up by main stream media.

FigNewton said...

Never believe statistics in Japan. It's all BS. (not that most countries are the same.) Suicide is a great example. Number of smokers is another. Saving face is the only stat they know.

Anonymous said...

Areva,

FYI, survey meters tend to pick up more radiation actually(for measuring alpha, beta, gamma and Xray). I constantly get 0.15 microsievert/hr around my house now with my PRM-8000 geiger counter. It is a number that I would not consider dangerous actually

arevamirpal::laprimavera said...

@anon at 3:53PM, yes I have read those "rumors". There are even more horrific "rumors" up in Fukushima concerning pregnancy but I won't relate unless I have more solid sources. It's just too horrible to even mention as rumor.

Anonymous said...

"I constantly get 0.15 microsievert/hr around my house now with my PRM-8000 geiger counter"

The PRM-8000 is calibrated for cesium 137. Unless the source of the radiation is really cesium 137, that reading isn't meaningful. What matters for you would be an increase above the general ambient reading in your house.

The report about the sanitary napkin might just be a rumor, but if it is accurate the point is that it was double normal ambient radiation in the person's house.

BTW, you'd probably be better off using CPM.

Anonymous said...

Well, contamination is defined as 2 or 3 times ambient. If Tanagura-machi is between 0.17 to 0.49 microsievert/hr outdoors and Unicharm does run tests on that basis, the product would -strictly speaking- not be contaminated. If it was, they might just as well close that factory - and many others with it.

Really depends on your intention.

doitujin said...

but those rumors about pregnancy/abortion, is there even any chance in japan to get solid data?

after chernobyl, for example turkey published information about more born children without brain than usual, but is the japanese medical system also working like that? seemingly transparent, i mean? and especially, when it doesn't even get as far as birth in these cases?

it's not a specific object of research at the moment and when these women just go consult their doctors and then end the pregnancy because of one of various reasons, maybe no one officially lists and publishes numbers, details, the results of the examinations and probably in the end there won't be any official information at all... i fear exactly that... the only real counter-measure would maybe be if they would already be examining almost every pregnant women from early pregnancy on and be told to collect data in every case possible. but like now, how is this supposed to get beyond mere rumor state... i don't really trust in the medical workers sense of independent data collecting too much, to be honest. but as usually, one can only wait.

doitujin said...

i'm not sure if this also includes cases with early abortions and women from farer away...? and what exactly they are trying to find out, actually... "health effects" is kind of general
-> http://mainichi.jp/select/weathernews/20110311/nuclear/archive/news/2011/08/20110812k0000e040069000c.html

len said...

Could the women of Japan start a committee of their own and go public on the web , publishing any hard data they have . Scans , malformed fetuses and et cetera could be mapped and collated .

Anonymous said...

"Anonymous said...
I just knew today from Japanese person that there women, 4months pregnant in Tokyo who did abortion, because ultrasound was showing embrions without brain, and there are multiple such cases."

Do these women really have any other choice at this point?

Anonymous said...

Well, I hate to think what the new babies being born in the next few years are going to look like, after seeing the Chernobyl ones!

What 1000's of years of invaders couldn't do to destroy Japan, the Japanese people did it to themselves! Great job!

david Stanley said...

And when it comes to their fancy cars who will buy a Lexus now?

Anonymous said...

First of all, Ex-SKF thanks fro the great work!
I was wondering about the statistics of abortions. As some people mentioned, they can be easily manipulated or should we say corrected by officials? Anyway, in case the number of abortions or still births is going up, the authorities might be able to conceal it. But how about the number of births? Maybe they forgot to tweak that number. It might be interesting to compare the number of births in each of the last few months with the number of births in the same month last year and the year before. An increase in abortions and still births should be accompanied by a drop in the actual birth rate.
Its definitely a lot of work, but maybe one of the few ways to get a more clear picture?

Anonymous said...

Is anyone testing Starkist tuna? They catch in the Pacific.

Anonymous said...

Why would a rise in abortion mean a drop in birth rate? Fucking conspiricist idiot, this is the sort of wishy washy thinking that corrupts so many young minds. Analysing birth rates would only work if the birth rate is an absolute constant which it is not. Birth rate would be expected to drop because people in Fukushima have more to worry about than just having sex you moron.

You people make me sick with your bullshit conspiracies, devote some time to solving some of the world problems instead of trying to make new ones from thin air and bullshit.

What China does affects us but not one of you bullshit conspiracy theorists has made any change? You waste your resources and time to scare people who would be far better off without listening to your crap, I'm fed up of people I know getting caught in this web of bollocks. 90% of conspiracies are unsubstantiated bullshit with anecdotal evidence, which is to say no evidence at all.

What we really need is an expose on the conspiracists, what the fuck is your secret agenda, you really are corrupting the minds of my friends and I see it happening this is not unsubstantiated, I can name friends who believe this shit when they used to be rational people. You guys claim to be against the bullshit and mind control but you should read some of the conspiracist stuff and understand what it says, a lot of it is highly subliminal with no real evidence trying to induce a false sense of realism through underhand tactics. I accuse the conspiracists of fucking over the minds of our youth.

Anonymous said...

"I accuse the conspiracists of fucking over the minds of our youth."

How do you know that 90% of conspiracy theories are bs? How do you calculate that number? Show me the equation, oh Bullshit Cutting One.

What youth need to know is that governments blatantly lie, big companies blatantly lie, even some of your neighbour's grandmothers will blatantly lie if it makes them some money. They won't care if you are harmed by being in the way. Such is human nature. Extrapolate and realize why all the conspiracy theories. Do you blame people for their mistrust? Everyday the common Japanese folk are being fucked over by their government, TEPCO and the nice neighbour who needs to sell his radioactive cows somehow(and will) so he can at least break even and not lose money.

Anonymous said...

Anyone, who belittles or condems all conspiracy theorists, is ceartain to be engaging in propaganda,and are possibly agents of an ongoing conspiracy! I am surprised that a Japenesse person would be so critical of the concept of conspiracy or conspiracy theorists.The manhattan project,''yes, that was at one time a conspiracy'' and the results of that project, should be all the evidence needed,to convince everyone in japan that indeed conspiracies do indeed exist !

Post a Comment