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Objective Other Benefits Countermeasure description Dietary advice Dose reduction by giving people dietary advice to reduce their radionuclide intake. Help people maintain their way of life. Enables informed choice. Provision of advice to people on ways to restrict their dietary radionuclide intake. For example, advice to reduce consumption of specific foodstuffs (e.g. game, mushrooms etc.), to not drink water from private cisterns, or to prepare food in ways that reduce contamination levels (e.g. washing and peeling vegetables and fruit, brining fish, cooking meat etc.). Advice may vary from suggestions as to which foodstuffs can be eaten without restrictions, which would be okay to eat occasionally, and which should be avoided completely. The advice can be communicated in the media (e.g. newspapers, internet) and as specially produced leaflets. Anyone who wants to reduce their dose, or who may have a high dose due to dietary preferences Caesium, strontium, but may be effective for other radionuclides Generally applicable to all population groups although may be most appropriate to critical groups (e.g. people with a high rate of wild food consumption). Plant-animal-people; plant-people, animal people Ingestion Any time after deposition, or for as long as selected foodstuffs have enhanced activity concentrations Possible liability from unforeseen health consequences or economic side-effects for specialist food producers. Countermeasure may be met with strong resistance from local populations for whom collection of wild (forest) food has a cultural and economic significance. For socially isolated/independent rural Populations e.g. the Saami, a key issue may be trust (or lack of) in the institutions/experts advising dietary restrictions. N/A Availability of communication lines, language and literacy of certain groups. Dialogue and dissemination of information is required with affected communities. Reductions of up to 85% have been reported for food preparation methods. Common methods are boiling, pickling and brining Effectiveness depends on foodstuffs, radionuclide concentrations and methods of preparation (see above). Willingness of affected population to accept this type of intervention and their willingness to follow the advice. The extent to which advice is used. Individual willingness to submit to restrictions. Effectiveness of preparation procedures will often only be effective if cooking fluids/bones etc. are discarded. Normal cooking implements None (unless this countermeasure is to be supplemented by provision of counting equipment) Communication lines (internet, fax machines, telephones etc.). Dependent on communication method Communication skills
Target Targeted radionuclides Scale of application Contamination pathway Exposure pathway Time of application
Constraints Legal constraints
Social constraints
Environmental constraints Communication constraints
Effectiveness: Countermeasure effectiveness Factors influencing effectiveness of procedure (Technical)
Factors influencing effectiveness of procedure (social)
Feasibility: Required specific equipment Required ancillary equipment Required utilities and infrastructure Required consumables Required skills
Required safety precautions Other limitations Waste: Amount and type Possible transport, treatment and storage routes. Factors influencing waste issues Doses: Averted dose Factors influencing averted dose Additional dose Intervention costs: Equipment Consumables Operator time Factors influencing costs
N/A N/A None, except household waste. N/A N/A Individual averted doses Willingness to follow advice, contamination level in foodstuffs, time after deposition N/A N/A Price for printing leaflets to be collated for different countries The time used for giving advice will depend on the communication method (personal contact, internet, telephone, fax etc.) Dialogue and dissemination of information about the countermeasure (its rationale and possible alternatives) within affected communities. Compensation can be considered in special cases, such as populations for whom “free-food” as a cultural or economic significance. For example, in Norway, reindeer herders are given compensation for having an alternative diet amounting to 250 EUR/y per family member if the contamination in their reindeers was above 600 Bq/kg the previous year (the CFIL for general foodstuffs). If the contamination was over 3000 Bq/kg (CFIL for reindeer meat for sale) the previous year, each person receives an extra compensation of 125 EUR/y. The compensation can be used for buying less contaminated reindeer meat from other areas, buying other kinds of meat or clean feeding reindeers consumed by the family to obtain <600 Bq/kg. N/A
Communication costs
Compensation costs
Waste cost Assumptions
Cost effectiveness: Side-effect evaluation: Ethical considerations
Environmental impact
Agricultural impact
Self help Improves personal control and ability to make informed choices Communicates authorities‟ trust in the public Possible liability issues in the case of unforeseen health effects Possible negative effects on food producers if the public avoids specialist foodstuffs from contaminated areas. Possible negative effects on the poor if the countermeasure results in cheap “contaminated foodstuffs”. Possible ecological effect from increase in game population if hunting/fishing declines, or cessation of large-scale fungi/berry collection. Could be positive (e.g. conservation of habitats and increased nutrient availability resulting from increased decomposition) or negative (e.g., change in ecological equilibrium, lack of foodstuffs for due to increased competition). Knock-on lack of production from social side-effects on food production in one area may result in increased production on other areas. Possible increased utilisation of agricultural grasslands or crops by „uncontrolled‟ game species
Social impact
Other side effects, pos. or neg. Stakeholder opinion Practical experience
Changed relationship to land/forests and potential change of behaviour resulting from changes in people‟s perceptions of land as a „natural‟ resource, to being „unnatural‟ or in some way its resources damaged/polluted. Loss of traditional activities e.g. gathering free food Negative social and psychological impact – loss of sense of control over the situation as all local/homeproduced foods are „bad‟. Should perhaps be combined with advice on how to manage diets (also depends on trust in experts/responsible authorities). Replacement foods may be required Used in western Europe (especially Scandinavia) and the FSU after the Chernobyl accident. Proven to be a cheap and effective countermeasure, if people are willing to follow the advice. Brynildsen, L.I. et al., 1996. Countermeasures for radiocaesium in animal products in Norway after the Chernobyl accident – techniques, effectiveness and costs. Health Physics 70: 665-672. Strand, P. et al. Chernobyl fallout: internal doses to the Norwegian population and the effect of dietary advice. Health Physics 63(4), 385-392, 1992. Petäjä, E. et al. Reduction of radioactive caesium in meat and fish by soaking. Journal of Env. Radioactivity 16:273-285, 1992. IAEA Technical Report Series No. 364: Handbook of parameter values for the prediction of radionuclide transfer in temperate environments, 1994. Long et al., 1995 Tønnessen, A. et al. 1996. Personal use of countermeasures seen in a coping perspective. Radiation Protection Dosimetry, 68: 261-266. Self-help countermeasure. Can be combined with provision of counting equipment. Examples of edible fungi species grouped on basis of radiocaesium accumulating ability: Suillus, Tricholoma, Xerocomus, Rozites (high accumulators) Cantharellus, Lactarius (medium accumulators) Leccinum, Boletus (low accumulators)
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