One of the worst things about the hysteria concerning radiation is how it seems to preclude a reasonable assessment of risk. Medical scanners, which are intended to save the life of the person receiving radiation, are deemed okay, and are strictly regulated and independently tested. Security scanners are ignored, because they're at once perceived as necessary and at the same time perceived as unconscionable.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center recently got copies of documents through FOIA requests that suggest that TSA employees have claimed to have discovered cancer clusters within their ranks, presumably due to excessive exposure to X-rays from the security scanners. They were, naturally, ignored, and not issued dosimeters. Regardless of whether this particular instance is found to be true, the fact remains that security scanners are tested for compliance by the companies that sell them, which is simply asking for trouble.
Apparently, the DHS lied to USA Today about NIST testing. Quoting Janet Napolitano in USA Today,
AIT machines are safe, efficient, and protect passenger privacy.
They have been independently evaluated by the Food and Drug
Administration, the National Institute of Standards and
Technology, and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics
Laboratory, who have all affirmed their safety.
The NIST responded,
NIST is a little concerned about the USA Today op-ed...
* NIST does not do product safety testing
* NIST did not test AIT machines for safety
* NIST measured the dose of a single machine and compared it to the standard
and John Hopkins appears to have determined that it meets standards for the general public, with a few recommendations that I don't know if anyone went forward with, but doesn't appear to have tested for effects on operators.
Of course, it's quite possible that TSA employees running the machines are being exposed to dangerous levels of radiation, and it's quite possible that they are not. The whole point is, no one appears to have independently tested the issue. Regardless of what you think of TSA employees, they don't deserve this.
On a larger note, to prevent things like this from happening, people need to come to a better understanding of radiation, and also need to have more respect for science.
There used to be a lot more conservative scientists and engineers, but the other team has completely abandoned science in favor of bizarre ideologies like human life beginning at conception, alternatives to evolution, rejection of the evidence staring them in the face concerning climate change, the Laffer curve, and so forth.
Meanwhile, on the left, we've seen a fetishization of energy efficiency as if efficiency can solve all our energy problems without the need for new power plants in contradiction to Amdahl's law; a fear of nuclear technology that seems based on a rightful fear of weaponization, a rightful concern for waste, a rightful concern for mismanagement, and also a less rightful ignorance; a bizarre embrace of alternative medical "technologies" such as homeopathy but even the unconscionable Radon Health Mine, a rightful embrace of whole foods that reaches such excesses as unpasteurized milk, and a disdain for reality-based institutions like the CDC that put evidence and public health before ideology.
But like I said, the Left has at least as long as I've been paying attention pretty much consistently been willing to put evidence before ideology, and I'm hoping that the Obama administration can try to come up with some evidence-based rules for security scanners and get some independent testing of devices that have the ability to emit harmful radiation.