Impact of Natural Background Radiation on Health

High natural background radiation is a constant presence in the lives of those inhabiting some coastal regions of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. While there is agreement about the existence of radiation, some studies claim that it has no impact on the health of the population, while others disagree. There is a need to examine these findings critically, because of implications for public health, and to understand some of the technical reasons for why some papers appear to find no support for evidence (lack of statistical significance) of impact on health due to high levels of background radiation.

The authors would like to thank Saparya Suresh for her insightful comments on statistical significance in developing this article; Prabasaj Paul and Jan Beyea for reviewing earlier drafts and offering useful and critical comments; and the anonymous reviewer for providing suggestions to sharpen the manuscript.

There has been a long-standing debate about the impact of nuclear radiation on human health (Beyea 2012). This debate becomes most contentious when dealing with impact of severe accidents like the ones at Fukushima in 2011 and Chernobyl in 1986. In the case of Chernobyl, for example, the estimates of the number of deaths resulting from the accident range from a few tens to nearly a million (Ramana 2006). The official Soviet Union death count for years was 31 (Marples 1988: 31–36), and this number was repeated by many, for example, in India’s annual conference on radiation protection in 1989 (Nagaratnam 1989).

Although there have been no severe accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima in India, there has been a debate about the impact of radiation on human health. This debate is over a more quotidian source of radiation prevalent in some coastal regions in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The sand on the beaches in these areas contains large quantities of a naturally occurring radioactive material called monazite, and this results in high levels of radiation which is a constant presence in the lives of the inhabitants of these regions. There is agreement about the occurrence of the high levels of radiation. The debate has been about whether these high levels of radiation have resulted in any observable impact on health, and this question has resulted in many academic papers and articles over the decades. Some of these studies have concluded that there are no increased risks while others disagree. In this article, we discuss some of the technical reasons for why some papers appear to find no support for evidence (lack of statistical significance) of impact on health due to high levels of background radiation.