On February 13th, 2020, the Oversight Committee of the Fukushima Health Management Survey presented the new set of thyroid cancer data (up until September 30th, 2019). After the initial screening of approximately 300,000 children who were living in Fukushima Prefecture at the time of the multiple nuclear meltdowns or were born shortly thereafter (2011-2014), follow-up examinations were carried out every two years. The second examinations has already been completed, the third one is in its final phase and the fourth series of examinations has now been underway since 2018. During the past nine years, three trends have emerged quite clearly.

11.10.2016 How a society deals with the victims of a catastrophe tells you more about it than statistical data like its GDP or its unemployment rates. Since 2011, Fukushima Medical University regularly examines the thyroids of all inhabitants of Fukushima Prefecture, who were below 18 years of age at the time of the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe in order to detect cancer or precancerous lesions in time. While the costs for patients under the age of 18 are generally covered by the state, families have to pay doctor fees in advance and only get reimbursed after a certain delay. Furthermore, the Japanese health system generally requires patients older than 18 to pay 30% of all medical costs themselves. This also applies for thyroid exams for people who were exposed to radioactive fallout, as well as for potentially necessary biopsies, surgical operations or long-term therapies.

12.10.2016  In Fukushima, an extensive screening on thyroid cancer in children is running for almost 5 years now. Whereas the pro-nuclear Japanese government deliberately downplays the impacts of the multiple nuclear meltdowns, scientists, physicians and parents associations were at leastable to enforce this screening. Despite all justifiable criticism of this study like its limitation to Fukushima Prefecture, the lack of transparency or the influence of the nuclear lobby on Fukushima Medical University, which carries out the examination, this screening provides the possibility of early detection and therapy of thyroid cancer.

29.03.2016 As a result of the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe huge amounts of radioactivity were released into the environment. While the Japanese authorities made much of the contamination by radioactive iodine and cesium and while these radioisotopes are measured regularly in samples of soil, water and foodstuffs, the radioactive strontium contamination of humans and the environment is hushed up. Contamination maps do not exist ; at best, strontium measurements are carried out sporadically by individual research groups. Furthermore, strontium is not at all looked for in the foodstuffs-database, which is used to calculate the radiation exposure of the population through taking in contaminated food. But it is known that relevant amounts of radioactive strontium were found in the teeth and bones of livestock in Fukushima.

As physicians concerned with the effects of radioactive fallout on human health and the ecosystem, IPPNW critically reviewed the UNSCEAR report on Fukushima, which systematically underestimates the true extent of the catastrophe. Many of the assumptions are based on the two WHO/IAEA reports published in May 2012 and February 2013, which did not accurately portray the true extent of radiation exposure, followed faulty assumptions, ignored the ongoing radioactive emissions over the past 2½ years and excluded non-cancer effects of radiation.