Hormesis

I work in a fringe of the nuclear field and the effects of radiation exposure come up as part of my business.  Actually I'm involved in the measurement side of what someone might have ingested or inhaled.  The health effects of that are someone else's area.

I found out about hormesis in re radiation exposure.  I did a bit of digging and realized that most biological systems have a hormesis reaction.

Simply put, hormesis is an over-reaction to a supposed threat.  It's why vacines work and why your arm might react a lot to a bug bite.  The body is preparing for war and it doesn't know how much fighting it will do and the initial gear up for that war came be an overreaction.

There have been a couple of cases where the hormetic response to a radiation field has been demonstrated.  There were a block of apartment buildings in Taiwan which were built with highly active rebar. The occupants were exposed for about 15 years (if memory serrves!) and when the smoke cleared the health of the occupants were better in re cancer rates than a comparison population.

The other example is an area in India where there is a very high background field.  It's natural due to the type of rock the area sits upon.  Again, the health of the folks is better than others.

Ok, finally to the point.  Governments do this too.  Hmm, perhaps we all do.  Scary headline and we go nuts.  The UK government wants to take kids away from parents if the kids might be too radicalized -- whatever that is.

Post 9/11, airport security would be another example.

Might be that like a biological reaction, people overreact as a survival tool.

Having stood in too many airport security lines, I wish we could also step back and think about what we did and maybe relax a bit.

Joke: what's the difference between a cow and 9/11?  You can't milk a cow for 14 years. 

There is a lot riding on the 9/11 reaction.