Oh that definitely makes sense as to why this specific thing was brought up. To me it felt out of nowhere and reaching. This makes a ton more sense now and I can definitely see how your comment reads differently once I rebase myself. A lot of my frustration really has been about how people responding are ignoring the quantities of meat that need to be ingested.
I tend to not bring up my credentials because I feel like that shouldn't matter to the discussion. Plus, a lot of people have experience without credentials and I don't want to rub that in their face and argue from a place of authority. Just leads to credential bashing. One thing I would like to add about science, though, is that it is important to challenge the status quo. This is part of why I don't want credentials being at the forefront. Challenging should be encouraged. Of course, there's a right way and wrong way to do this. You have to do science and come up with a hypothesis/answer that has better explainability than the current consensus answer (if one exists). It is honestly one of the best learning tools you have. Every grad student spends a significant amount of time trying to reproduce works, as this is a way to learn. Either you verify the result (which is an unappreciated science win that we need more of) or you got a great new research direction (I'm no longer in physics). Many spend far too much time spinning their wheels as they fail to reproduce the results but are too self-critical to think that they might be right and the original work is wrong. It is an extremely important process and does teach you how to differentiate good works from bad works.
I figure you may be interested in some studies. I'd also encourage you to search some too. But you may find that there is far more work on tracing the radioactivity in the boar and other wildlife and far less on the actual health effects to the animals or populations. Again, we're pinned to government defined safety levels rather than risk of cancer[note]:
- Radiocesium accumulation and germline mutations in chronically exposed wild boar from Fukushima, with radiation doses to human consumers of contaminated meat[0]
> Hypothetical consumption of contaminated wild boar meat from radioactively contaminated areas in Fukushima, at the per capita pork consumption rate (12.9 kg y^−1), would result in an average effective annual dose of 0.9 mSv y^−1, which is below the annual ingestion limit of 1 mSv y^−1. Additionally, a consumption rate of about 1.4 kg y^−1 of the most contaminated meat in this study would not exceed annual ingestion limits.
This paper makes very similar conclusions as I do, just through a different point of view. They calculated dosage by predicting the consumption whereas I sought to find the amount you'd need to eat to reach the limit. But two things to note: first, the Japanese public dosage limit is much lower than that in the EU (1mSv/yr vs 20mSv/yr), and second, the dosage limit decreased post Fukushima[1]
- Evaluation of DNA damage and stress in wildlife chronically exposed to low-dose, low-dose rate radiation from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant accident[2]
> Our results suggest that wild boar and snakes chronically exposed to LD-LDR radiation sufficient to prohibit human occupancy were not experiencing significant adverse health effects as assessed by biomarkers of DNA damage and stress.
- Exemplifying the “wild boar paradox”: dynamics of cesium-137 contaminations in wild boars in Germany and Japan[3]
Linking this one because there is a weird phenomena to be aware of (I just learned this too! I knew of a difference but not that it was almost 3x)
> The effective half-life of 137Cs in wild boar meat was much longer in Germany (7.3 y) than in Japan (2.6 y), respectively.
[note] A big reason for excessive safety factors is that you want to account for vulnerable people. This can be pregnant women, children, babies being breast fed, or even people with disabilities. My analysis and [0] account for this in one way, but not in a different. Nuance matters and shit is complicated. But here's some background.
I tend to not bring up my credentials because I feel like that shouldn't matter to the discussion. Plus, a lot of people have experience without credentials and I don't want to rub that in their face and argue from a place of authority. Just leads to credential bashing. One thing I would like to add about science, though, is that it is important to challenge the status quo. This is part of why I don't want credentials being at the forefront. Challenging should be encouraged. Of course, there's a right way and wrong way to do this. You have to do science and come up with a hypothesis/answer that has better explainability than the current consensus answer (if one exists). It is honestly one of the best learning tools you have. Every grad student spends a significant amount of time trying to reproduce works, as this is a way to learn. Either you verify the result (which is an unappreciated science win that we need more of) or you got a great new research direction (I'm no longer in physics). Many spend far too much time spinning their wheels as they fail to reproduce the results but are too self-critical to think that they might be right and the original work is wrong. It is an extremely important process and does teach you how to differentiate good works from bad works.
I figure you may be interested in some studies. I'd also encourage you to search some too. But you may find that there is far more work on tracing the radioactivity in the boar and other wildlife and far less on the actual health effects to the animals or populations. Again, we're pinned to government defined safety levels rather than risk of cancer[note]:
- Radiocesium accumulation and germline mutations in chronically exposed wild boar from Fukushima, with radiation doses to human consumers of contaminated meat[0]
> Hypothetical consumption of contaminated wild boar meat from radioactively contaminated areas in Fukushima, at the per capita pork consumption rate (12.9 kg y^−1), would result in an average effective annual dose of 0.9 mSv y^−1, which is below the annual ingestion limit of 1 mSv y^−1. Additionally, a consumption rate of about 1.4 kg y^−1 of the most contaminated meat in this study would not exceed annual ingestion limits.
This paper makes very similar conclusions as I do, just through a different point of view. They calculated dosage by predicting the consumption whereas I sought to find the amount you'd need to eat to reach the limit. But two things to note: first, the Japanese public dosage limit is much lower than that in the EU (1mSv/yr vs 20mSv/yr), and second, the dosage limit decreased post Fukushima[1]
- Evaluation of DNA damage and stress in wildlife chronically exposed to low-dose, low-dose rate radiation from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant accident[2]
Paper: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34120002/
> Our results suggest that wild boar and snakes chronically exposed to LD-LDR radiation sufficient to prohibit human occupancy were not experiencing significant adverse health effects as assessed by biomarkers of DNA damage and stress.
- Exemplifying the “wild boar paradox”: dynamics of cesium-137 contaminations in wild boars in Germany and Japan[3]
Linking this one because there is a weird phenomena to be aware of (I just learned this too! I knew of a difference but not that it was almost 3x)
> The effective half-life of 137Cs in wild boar meat was much longer in Germany (7.3 y) than in Japan (2.6 y), respectively.
[note] A big reason for excessive safety factors is that you want to account for vulnerable people. This can be pregnant women, children, babies being breast fed, or even people with disabilities. My analysis and [0] account for this in one way, but not in a different. Nuance matters and shit is complicated. But here's some background.
[0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026974912...
[1] https://www.env.go.jp/en/chemi/rhm/basic-info/1st/pdf/basic-...
[2] https://cvmbs.source.colostate.edu/researchers-find-few-adve...
[3] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10967-022-08528-2