Japan Raises Alert of Fukushima Toxic Leak to “Level Three”
Local Editor
Japan is to raise alert regarding the leak of toxic water from the Fukushima nuclear plant to Level Three "serious incident" on Wednesday.
The leak of toxic water at the Fukushima plant will be upgraded from a level 1 "anomaly" to a level three "serious incident" on an international scale for radiological releases, a spokesman for Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) stated.
Water with high levels of radiation still leaking from a storage tank at Fukushima is so contaminated that a person standing close to it for an hour would receive five times the annual recommended limit for nuclear workers in a year, according to Reuters.
"Judging from the amount and the density of the radiation in the contaminated water that leaked ... a level 3 assessment is appropriate," the NRA mentioned in a document.
Nausea and a drop in white blood cells are among the symptoms of a person subjected to radiation.
Moreover, eighteen children from the Fukushima Prefecture have been found to have thyroid cancer, while 25 others are suspected of having the illness, Japan's NHK website reported.
Medical examinations are being conducted on all 360,000 children from the area who were aged 18 and younger at the time of the 2011 accident.
Local children are thought to be at risk of developing cancer as radioactive substances released can accumulate in their thyroid glands. The panel reported that it could not yet conclude whether the nuclear accident had an impact on the frequency of cancer among children.
Source: News Agencies, edited by website team
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