Nuclear Crisis in Japan Raises Worries About Radiation Risks

This is the VOA Special English Health Report.

这里是美国之音慢速英语健康报道。

The crisis at the damaged Fukushima Dai-Ichi Nuclear Power Station in northern Japan has raised worries about radiation risks. We spoke 1 Tuesday with Jonathan Links, an expert in radiation health sciences. He is a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Maryland.

日本北部受损的福岛第一核电站危机引发了人们对辐射风险的担忧。周二，我们联系了辐射卫生科学专家乔纳森·林克斯（Jonathan Links）。他是马里兰州约翰霍普金斯大学彭博公共卫生学院的一名教授。

Professor Links says workers within the nuclear plant are the only people at risk of extremely high doses of radiation.

林克斯教授表示，核电站工作人员是唯一处于大剂量辐射风险的人群。

JONATHAN LINKS: "Of course, we don't know what doses they've received, but the only persons at risk of acute radiation effects are the workers."

林克斯：“当然，我们不知道他们受到了多大剂量的辐射。但他们是唯一处于严重辐射影响风险中的人群。”

For other people, he says, there may be a long-term worry. People can get cancer from low doses of ionizing radiation, the kind released in a nuclear accident.

他表示，对其他人来说可能存在一种长期隐患。人们可能会因为核事故释放的小剂量电离辐射而致癌。

Professor Links says scientists can use computers to quickly model where radioactive material has blown and settled. Then they measure how large an area is contaminated. He says if the situation is serious enough, officials could take steps like telling people not to eat locally grown food or drink the water.

林克斯教授表示，科学家可以使用电脑快速模拟什么地方会受放射性物质影响，然后计算出受污染区域的大小。如果情况非常严重，官方可以采取一些措施，例如告诉人们不要食用当地种植的食物，不要饮用当地的水。

JONATHAN LINKS: "But that would only be the case if there was a significant release and, because of wind direction, the radioactive material was blown over the area, and then settled out of the air into and onto water, plants, fruits and vegetables."

林克斯：“但这仅仅是在存在严重泄漏的前提下，并且由于风向，放射性物质飘过该区域，并从空气中进入到水、植物、水果、蔬菜中。

The reactors 3 at Fukushima are on the Pacific coast. But Professor Links says people should not worry about any radioactive material leaking into the ocean.

福岛的核电站反应堆位于太平洋岸边。但林克斯教授表示，人们不用担心放射性物质泄漏到海洋中。

JONATHAN LINKS: "Even in a worst-case scenario 4 accident, the sea provides a very high degree of dilution 5. So the concentration of radioactivity in the seawater would still be quite low."

林克斯：“即使是在情况最严重的事故中，海洋也能提供高度稀释。因此海水中的放射性浓度仍将相当低。”

Japan is the only country to have had atomic bombs dropped on it. That memory from World War Two would create a stronger "psychological sensitivity" to radiation exposure, Professor Links says.

林克斯教授表示，日本是唯一遭受过原子弹打击的国家。来自二战的那种记忆可能造成日本人对辐射更加敏感。

Next month is the twenty-fifth anniversary of the explosion and fire that destroyed a reactor 2 at Chernobyl in Ukraine. The nineteen eighty-six event was the world's worst accident in the nuclear power industry.

下月将是乌克兰切尔诺贝利核电站反应堆爆炸事故25周年。1986年发生的这次事故是全球核电行业最严重的一次。

A new United Nations report says more than six thousand cases of thyroid cancer have been found. These are in people who were children in affected 6 areas of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. The report says that by two thousand five the cancers had resulted in fifteen deaths.

联合国一份新的报告称，目前已经发现超过6000例甲状腺癌患者，他们都是在白俄罗斯，俄罗斯和乌克兰这些受影响地区长大的。报告称，截至2005年甲状腺癌已导致15人死亡。

The cancers were largely caused by drinking contaminated milk. The milk came from cows that ate grass where radioactive material had fallen.

大部分的癌症患者主要是由于饮用受污染的牛奶造成的，这些牛奶产自吃了放射性物质污染的牧草的奶牛。