We are all familiar with the images of the earthquake and tsunami that struck
Japan in March of 2011. In a matter of minutes a huge swath of northeastern
Japan was devastated. What once were quiet fishing villages, coastal cities and
some of the most productive farmland in the world was scoured from the face of
the earth. Nine months later the death toll and financial loss cannot be given
firm numbers. But a less photogenic aspect of the catastrophe continues to
plague the physical and mental well being of the residents of that nation. The
containment failure at the Fukushima facility gave Japan the unenviable
position of having the second most serious nuclear accident in history, wedged
between Russia’s Chernobyl and Three Mile Island in the USA. The record of
misinformation and cold-hearted disregard for issues of health and safety
displayed by the government and corporate leaders of Japan leave the residents
there powerless, frustrated and with a lingering deep-seated fear.

TEPCO, the largest energy provider in Japan, worked with the government and the
well-heeled media there to downplay the severity of the accident at every
stage. The government and media in the US were even more robust in denying that
this accident was any reflection of the level of safety at nuclear facilities
here, while underplaying any negative affects from the release of air and
waterborne radioactive contaminates. It is sadly ironic that these two
governments were responsible for the first major nuclear experiment on human
beings—the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Now, without adequate monitoring
or accountability, the global nuclear industry—with subsidies and liability
protection from governments around the world, is continuing the experiment on
all of us.  In a world where seismic activity seems to be on the increase along with global climate change, this assault on the health and economic safety of millions of people, may in a more enlightened age be recognized for what it is—a crime against humanity.

Fukushima, like many nuclear facilities around the US, was scheduled for decommission years ago. But TEPCO, like its counterparts here, has influence over
governmental policy that trumps concerns for public safety. The orgy of profits
from running the unsafe facility made the game of Russian roulette they were
playing with the safety of nearby communities an acceptable risk. On the other
side of the disaster, which even governmental sources admit will make farming
impossible for at least 40 years in the affected area, the energy giant is
being protected from liability by its friends in government. While the
immediate threat of a run-away meltdown was narrowly averted, the spent fuel
rods, which were such a concern, are still poised high in the
earthquake/tsunami-impacted towers—like swords from vengeful dark
angels—awaiting the next shift in the earth’s crust to come crashing down. If
there is a major earthquake before a more permanent solution can be found, the
resulting nuclear disaster will make the first one pale in comparison. If this
seems a reasonable risk, the fact that US and Russian nuclear engineers are
still working on a permanent solution for the Chernobyl plant 25 years after
that accident, should give reason for serious concern.

As unconscionable as putting profit ahead of public safety in their continued
support for nuclear power, the Japanese government and their supporters abroad
have yet to honestly face the scope of problems related to the Fukushima
accident. Perhaps the most obvious and tragic is the plight of residents of
Fukushima City located outside of the official radioactive danger zone. Mothers
from that city have been staging protests and asking for protection for their
children when it became known to the public, the high levels of radioactivity
in schools in the area. After the supposed cleanup by government agencies that
gave the go-ahead for families to move back to the city, months later it was
learned that instead of reducing the levels of contamination, the government
merely raised the acceptable levels of exposure for children by a factor of 20.
Noting the enormous costs in relocating hundreds of thousands of residents and
refusing to hold TEPCO financially responsible, the government has turned its
back this traumatized population.

But it is not just the residents of the immediate accident zone that have suffered
because of the dishonesty of a government complicit with those in the energy
industry guilty of criminal negligence. In the aftermath of the disaster at
Fukushima, people around the country were given false assurances concerning the
safety of everything from beef to milk and down to the very basics for
survival—clean air and water. The fears relating to the breakdown of social
systems such as the public transportation system most citizens of Japan rely
on, food shortages, or structural damage from the next earthquake, can be
allayed through careful planning and an increase in individual and community
disaster readiness. But the unrelenting fear from the ongoing exposure to
increased levels of nuclear contaminates and the lack of reliable information
about the magnitude and potential risks posed by this exposure, leaves
residents of Japan in constant dread. Add a feeling of powerlessness in face of
current dangers and future disasters and you get an unhealthy level of stress
affecting a majority of residents of Japan.

Again the government shows that it is unresponsive to the concerns of its citizens.
With a nearly unanimous sentiment among Japanese people for switching its
energy dependence from nuclear to safer forms of energy production, the
government has refused to take steps in that direction. Like their mentors in
the US, the news/entertainment media in Japan are in lockstep with the ruling
parties, making them mouthpieces for governmental policy. While the people of
Japan see their future and that of their children left up to chance in an
effort to shore up a failing economic and political system, alternatives are
kept out of the discussion. Just as in the United States, the corporate
interests representing the rich have bought the political process and the mass
media that supports its narrow vision of profit and greed over human need. This
lack of a broad democratic discussion in this crucial time of crisis makes a
rational solution impossible and merely feeds the feelings of frustration and
resentment growing among the population. The nuclear time bombs ticking in
their midst can only be disarmed by a social tsunami bringing the people of
Japan into democratic action for the health and welfare of future
generations.

While Japan suffers more directly from the disaster at Fukushima, no nuclear accident
can be confined within national borders. The contaminated materials, released
into the air and water, have spread around the globe. A plume of contamination
from the millions of gallons of highly radioactive water used to avert a
meltdown at the facility is spreading across the Pacific Ocean. Airborne
particles were traced across North America but downplayed in US media as not
posing serious health problems. A common way to dismiss the health risks
involved in low-level radiation exposure is to compare the effect to that of a
routine x-ray. This is misleading. The x-ray is a tool of medicine and
protective measures are taken—such as lead aprons over sensitive areas. The
medical industry abandoned using x-rays on pregnant women for a good reason,
but pregnant women and young children are not protected from unplanned exposures.
Contamination that finds its way into water or food sources, especially milk
products, has multiplied affects. And the bottom line, which is generally
accepted medical science outside the nuclear industry, is that any exposure
to nuclear radiation increases chances for cancer and other health risks.
Children and the unborn are the most vulnerable.

The nuclear disaster at Fukushima is a continuing health risk for the people living
in Japan, but it is also a global disaster and should prompt a response from the
international community. Twenty-five years after the explosion at Chernobyl
shocked the world, we still do not have in place a monitoring system to track
the release of radio-active contaminants. The national and international
nuclear regulatory agencies are joined at the hip to the nuclear power and
weapons industry and lack any independent investigative or enforcement powers.
We can no longer claim that the danger was due to “soviet incompetence” and did
not pose a threat in advanced capitalist nations. We need an independent
international team of scientists with the means to monitor and regulate
existing nuclear power plants around the world and in case of a nuclear
accident gather as much information as possible about exposure levels and
threats to food and water supplies. This information must not be edited or
censored. It should be readily available to all concerned citizens.

The immediate task of such a team would be to study all the available information
from the international scientific community relating to the Fukushima accident.
We need to quantify as nearly as possible what the global effects of this major
release of nuclear materials. This should be combined with a joint effort of
scientists on the ground in Japan to evaluate the impact of the accident on
food and water supplies and the radiation dispersal patterns throughout the
Japanese islands. Radiation detection devices should be made available to the
public to monitor levels of contamination, especially in food and water
supplies. The results of these readings along with health records could be used to amass a database capable of tracking the long-term effects of the accident and providing the population a reliable source of information not controlled by the nuclear
industry or the government. Instead of controlling information for political or
economic reasons, this team would disseminate their findings based on science.
This would help replace the uncertainty and fear currently plaguing residents
of Japan with reliable information.

A global picture of Fukushima, based on unbiased scientific information, will
help us prepare for the next major release of nuclear materials. As long as we
have nuclear power and nuclear weapons we will need to prepare for the next
‘nuclear incident’. Instead of protecting the nuclear industry and the
governmental systems that support it, these studies will use this information
to protect human life. As long as ignorance and deception return a profit for
industry and protect the current political leadership, the truth about nuclear dangers
will remain hidden. Whether from natural disasters, faulty equipment, or human
error the likelyhood of major nuclear accidents are very high. Add to that the
arsenal of nuclear weapons and the possibility of either state terrorist or
individual terrorist attacks using nuclear devices and the probability
increases. Open scientific studies of current nuclear accidents will best
prepare us to respond in a timely efficient manner to the next crisis. Such
information is also crucial for a broader discussion concerning the real costs
of continued reliance on nuclear technology for power—both in the economic and
political sense. Since governments and the economic forces that control them
are committed to the use of nuclear power and nuclear weapons, we need at the
very least, to have a plan to mitigate the dangers they pose to the health and
welfare of the citizens of the world.