How much radon is too much radon? (Lowes, asbestos, install)

[potatosoup]

Just did tests on a home (yeah I'm back to buying, having too much trouble finding fairly priced dry land), and the air tests show average of 11, and water is 4100. Highs for air were up to 16, lows were 6.

Is it likely to be hard to remediate the air? I've read that remediating the water with a filter results in a radioactive filter that is dangerous to handle. I also heard that showering with water that is high in radon will release it into the air. Will keeping bathrooms very ventiliated relieve this?

[M3 Mitch]

Units are picrocurie per milliliter I think, right? Here is a link with info from EPA.

The bottom line is that no one really knows the effects of low dose radiation, there simply isn't any data, no one dies from it.

A Citizen's Guide to Radon | Radon | US EPA

[Barking Spider]

The action level for radon in air is 4.0 picocuries per liter. A mitigation system should be installed. High levels in water can release radon into the air. Have not heard anything about a filter that would be dangerous to handle - not sure about that.

[Cosmic]

If you read all this stuff about Radon, you would think it is a smoking gun and there is no debate about the sure fired danger from Radon. That is not exactly true.

In fact there is almost no direct proof that Radon is harmful. Nothing like most other diseases where they attempt to establish direct correlations based on some observed evidence. Example there is some type of chemical in the ground in a particular location. It is the mechanism that causes a disease. They do a study and relate the incidences of disease to an elevated level in the area. There will be a direct correlation between increased exposure and increased incidents of the disease. Just about always works to some degree.

Do a study for increased skin cancer in Denver, higher elevation more UV exposure, results correlate as expected. Increased exposure, increased cancers.

That does not appear to be true for Radon. They have attempted to do all sorts of studies to link higher rates of cancer to higher rate levels of Radon by location. More often or not, they get a negative result or the data shows no effect. Then the wags claim it is all invalid. Works for just about all other types of disease but Radon is the exception. In fact the more you look, that idea of Radon always being the exception from standard practice and methods starts to really stand out.

Ok, forget humans, they do the same thing with just cell cultures. Use a control group of cells, measure the amount of mutations, expose them to Radon under controlled conditions, measure the amount of mutations, essentially no difference. Wags claim it is not a valid method.

The only method acceptable according to the wags is some Ivory Tower method where miners are the prime subjects. They are exposed to not only elevated levels of Radon but a whole hosts of other potential cancer causing elements. But poof as by magic, the Radon is the only thing that can give them increased cancer levels. All the other potential contributing causes are basically discounted. Then that method extrapolates that so called data to what would happen to a person living in a house with some level of Radon. The actual cancer cases are not identified to a particular location, individual or data set as normally done for most types of disease. They pull numbers of a hat, claim a percentage of all cancers must be caused by Radon. If you did this for just about any other disease could have boo-coo fun. Again the idea of an exception.

Then you get the idea of an indicator species. If this is available in the general environment and it harms humans, does it also harm some other species. Usually this is true for most things harmful to humans. Some other critter is also at risk. It would appear this avenue is never explored, it is done all the time with other risks by biologists and that type folks.

The real chuckle is then it turns out Radon is actually used in a form of medical therapy. Both in the USA and Europe. Underground mines and spas are used to expose humuns for a type of medical treatment for a range of ailments. Sometimes at extreme levels, USA up to like 1400, Europe some places go as high as readings of 3600. The USA is more unregulated in approach. Europe has a very long history and they tend to have a far more medical type regime with specified treatments, exposures, tracking of results for a particular patient. Treatments can be over decades in some cases. They do not report any known incidence for cancer caused by Radon exposures and note many benefits to treating a variety of diseases. There are lots of documentation from the medical side of it, some of tinged with more than a lil sarcasm. Why are these patients any different than those miners claimed to be so important? They are seeing even higher levels of Radon but probably have far fewer of the other contributing potential elements that the miners faces because the miners distrub the mine to do their work.

It would appear the Medico have the best view of what should be the risk but again all that type of info is discounted. Again you get the exception idea. I can't think of one other example where something is declared harmful but is then used in extreme as a medical type treatment.

I've looked at this subject a number of times to attempt to determine is Radon really a harmful substance. I can find nothing that convinces me it is. There is not anything that mildly looks like a smoking gun. Especially if some facts do not seem to fit they just throw out more lame BS.

What is always a bit puzzling is the subject of smoking. Radon is one of the components in tobacco smoke. In some cases you can find statements claiming Radon is protective, in others it is dismissed as being a harmful component at all. It seems like Radon can be treated anyway desired, for any purpose depending on the situation.

What does seem to be afoot is an industry that by hook or crook is determined to force folks to pay them for something that may or may not be required. It also seems Hell bent not to ever develop any type of testing, mechanism or method to actually prove the case beyond doubt.

In fact that has already happened. In many cases you can not sell a house without paying, playing by their rules. Probably a lot more of this coming down the pike. It happened in the lead abatement industry, happened in the asbestos removal, lots of other things will be next. The chuckle is once they make the rules the facts will not matter. The risk levels will be immaterial. Today it is sort of voluntary for most homeowners, in future it probably will not be. The real danger is in the type of precedent. Houses do not have to be constructed to a standard to prevent it but it is then hung about the neck of the homeowner to pay.

Bureaucracy, rules and regulation will hide all the facts, at some point, you will not be able to question any of it. There will just be a swarm of "Experts" to solve every problem, real or imagined. Radon is just the tip of the iceberg. It sort of reminds me of many states car inspection programs. When first started it sort of made sense but it morphed more into a money making scheme for lots of operators. The facts can be anything they say they are.

[Barking Spider]

.............

[Cosmic]

No matter how you look at this subject, there is always one thing missing.

The standard type analysis that shows definite links between cause and disease. Think about Love Canal, the PCB thing in Waltham, MA at the GE plants. There were cancer causing agents in the enviroment. As soon as anybody did a study they correlated immediately. Those areas had something causing abnormal high cancer rates, of course everybody knows what happened. The causes were identified, direct cause and effect was at work.

In just about all real cancer causing situations they are able to make a direct correlation between cause and effect. If you can't something must be wrong. (Chuckle)

This Radon thing has been looked at a zillion times. Many folks have tried to make the correlation in many countries. So far no smoking gun using the traditional methods.

They tried at the county level. None, ...... did not work. Wags said not big enough sample. They tried at the state level, still no cigar, always some lame objection, would not accept the results. Finally one guy did it for the entire country, huge sample. Still failed to correlate, he corrected for everything under the sun, nope still no result. In fact the results always showed about the same, no direct link between cancer and Radon, even if corrected for time. Some of it got to be pretty lame. It got so bad, they even coined a phase. Called the "Inverse Result". Hey, we are supposed to have increased cancers in areas with higher levels of Radon, they kept turning up a result where it was backwards. The highest areas of the country with Radon, had the lowest cancer rates. H,mmmm what is wrong here?

Just when you think it is safe to come out, gets far worse. They do a study for all types of low level radiation, not just Radon but all emitters, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, higher areas of background radiation. And to be sure they have it right, they do it on a huge population of Nuke Workers, those around all types of sources of radiation and who get exposed more than the general population. Something like 100K peeps and a huge control group on non-Nuke workers. Costs millions, takes like 10 years. Surely this will correlate as expected, this nuke stuff is going to be dangerous, come Hell or high water.

Results finally are in and it does not correlate. The results are like those from all the Radon studies. The nuke workers have lower cancer rates than for the population in general. A form of shock and awe, did not get the answer expected. Their occupations are not causing huge increases in cancer rates, apparently their exposures which are real are not a direct cause for cancer as had been previously assumed. This study does not even get published, it gets buried. Lots of chuckles if you want to discuss this subject from this angle. It looked like we might not have to die for our country after all.

There is this guy, Bernard Cohen. He did one of the national studies. Lots of info about the guy. He got beat up pretty bad for just telling the truth.

He just tried to do a traditional type approach, follow his nose, get the results and tell it like it was. He asks many of the questions about like I would. Some of it is a bit fun to read. Some of his papers have some funny tart comments. Especially when he takes on the methods used to claim there is a cause / effect relationship.

Bestselling author Michael Fumento reports: "Radon Redux."

Then you have Idaho. Maybe the Radon capital of the World. I actually had some boots on the ground experience with swimming in seas of Radon. Again you get to a point of saying what is really going on here?

Being an old farm boy, having some real World experience with a bunch of things, I always go back to the Duck Theory. If it walks like a duck, squeals like a duck, probably is a Duck. Failure to do both, probably ain't a duck.

I'm sort of busy today. Will come back and tell you a few Idaho war stories, that place should be crawling with wall to wall cancer. But again it never correlates. Idaho has a high radon level compared nationally but low cancer rates, places like Mississippi are exactly the opposite, low radon levels, high cancer rates.

There must be something I missed along the way. Probably some expert is about to explain the thing that puzzles me more than anything else. Them dudes in those spas or underground mines who get zapped with Lord Almighty levels of the stuff. How much does it take to kill you? How long does it take???? Even my poor experience I guess should have killed me. I got zapped a lot and I didn't even have to go down in any basement.

Will do it later...........

BTW, in the end it will all make lil difference. You will wind up playing the game the way it must be played today. No Tickee, No Washee. Be careful when somebody has to make his car payment. You will be in great danger until he gets paid.

[Barking Spider]

Radon mines for therapy is somewhat like radiation therapy for cancer treatment. While that kind of treatment might help some, it could actually harm others.
By the way, I think Pennsylvania has the highest levels in the country.
There are also a bunch of books around from the "earth is flat people", does not mean they are experts.

[Cosmic]

Originally Posted by Barking Spider

Radon mines for therapy is somewhat like radiation therapy for cancer treatment. While that kind of treatment might help some, it could actually harm others.
By the way, I think Pennsylvania has the highest levels in the country.
There are also a bunch of books around from the "earth is flat people", does not mean they are experts.

The Radon spas are not like radiation therapy for cancer treatment. It is sort of a homeopathic approach to medicine. Most diseases are not cured by the treatments. The treatments provide relief, not cures for sometimes in the months intervals.

The type treatments are not the same everywhere. The USA tends to be pretty ho-hum unregulated, you sort of go there, sit around, live underground for even weeks on end. Some peeps who have no disease, are healthy in all regards try it and claim it is relaxing. There are zero cases where harm is reported. Apparently there are not even anything like side effects.

The one thing I have to sort of check out is do any peeps take their dogs with them. Dogs are said to be super good test subjects for anything in the respiratory area and will show results similar to humans for the same exposure. Dogs apparently would be a very good indictor species. Why not try it? Some papers claim dogs if exposed to Radon do develop cancers but it is very vague. If true why would it not have been done a bunch to prove the case. Some of that might have been the experiments to use dogs in smoking experiments. Many claim it never happened. But it is pretty well documented it did happen with pretty tragic results. Apparently beagles were used. Why not just study dogs who stay in the basement in homes? Common sense might go a long ways.

European spas are different. Again the approach is along the homeopathic line and Radon treatment can be combined with other homeopathic medicines or treatments. The important point is none of the exposures result in harm or death. And some of it mind blasting high exposures.

As I said on many occasions none of makes sense, the subject is not simple and it sure is not proven. The medical side of it completely makes me unable to believe any of the other claims. You can't have it all different ways.

The Pennsylvania area has been studied to death. That Dr. Ben Cohen did it, so did many others. Apparently the results were always backwards, nobody ever got it to correlate, high Radon = High cancer risk.

Idaho is probably even better. You get mind blowing amounts / concentration in free outside air due to atmospheric inversion. Can be a real giggle if you can measure it. Most houses have amounts way above the limits. But again was studied to death. Nobody got it to correlate as a cause of cancer. Idaho does have its share of cancers, some of them sort of weird / rare but not what would be expected if Radon caused cancer.

In addition it had a pretty settled population back when I was there. ~345,000 souls and lots of these tended to spend their entire lives in that state. If you should have been able to prove it anywhere should have been in Idaho.

Lots of the Western states have weird cancers, many due to all the weapons testing, nuke production and the like. They also have lots of Radon. If it was simple somebody should have figured it out. Especially when they are claiming numbers like 22,000 deaths. How are those supposed to be distributed? Simple assumption is in the states with the highest Radon levels, more of those would be concentrated. Can anybody even remotely start to make that work? Hey, you would expect maybe a 1,000 deaths in just one high level state. Try breaking those type numbers down and laying it over the actual death numbers in states. Again I doubt any of it is going to correlate.

The thing never works if you look at it very hard. Don't take much poking to start to see the holes.

[Trying2BGreen]

There is an EPA recommended action level of 4 pCi/L (pico curies per liter) and that means the tested building should the radon level reduced.

What are the statistics for radon and health? 20,000+ deaths annually result from lung cancer (not related to smoking).
Radon is the second largest cause of lung cancer.
These numbers are for the US. EPA stepped back and issued recommendations due to funding/policy issues.

Remember to take a stand requires financial backing and that requires interested/concerned citizens (aka voters) to send that message to elected officials.

So what is a safe number? Zero, zero is a safe number. Specific to you, no one knows as with any disease or disease related conditions, genetics, environment, and "luck" may all factor in.

If you require radon mitigation (systems that reduce the amount of radon gas) they are easy to install by qualified (certified) mitigators. These are companies/individuals who are able to look at your specific home and determine how best to bring the radon level down. Anyone can install a system, the trick is getting the numbers down and keeping them down. NEHA has a list of certified mitigators for each state (www.neha.org). Ask each mitigator about education, experience, and insurance. Good mitigators offer warranties for materials and service. Don't forget to post-test.

Green starts from the ground up, test your home for radon (per EPA ad). Hope this is helpful. GO Green, BE Green! Pass it on.

[Cosmic]

Just understand what is being spun at you.

I just saw some of this. The new spin on the danger of Radon.

Question is a 400 level dangerous......... Well no not exactly.

Well what about 1000 ............. Well no not exactly.

What about 55............ No, that is not particular dangerous.

Then lets try 20............... No, still not very dangerous.

After all they have a horrible problem explaining why no harm can be documented in the Radon spas with huge levels of exposure. There is a new spin to the entire regime. Less is now more. You figure this one out.

So, they have a new approach. The most dangerous level is just a tad over 4. No real explantation for how this occurs, zero valid data to back up any claims. There is a new map of Radon levels in the USA. Now the highest area is claimed to be the state of IA. Again with zero correlation to show there is any actual relationship between reported lung cancer and Radon levels at either a state or county level. Exactly how many of those 20,000 deaths occur in Iowa, or was it 35,000, who cares what the number is. The hot zones go up into MI, WI. The former states claimed to be hot zones are down played for some reason. PA and ID only are shown with one county that typically exceeds a level 4. New type of spin control. Anything on the ground doesn't apparently count any more. Still no attempt to actually pin some of those deaths to particular locations. Just a big number that is rumored to be true. It becomes the justification by itself.

The chuckle being states like Ohio. On average, very few hot spots, something like maybe a level of 1 or less. Zero business opportunity, not much money to be made. Most of the USA is not shown to be above the "Dangerous Level". But if you can change the acceptable level to be zero then all of the USA is in play. Of course nobody has the first foggy clue how to be able to deliver a so called cure to zero level.

Part of this appears to be a take off to the approach used with asbestos. They had no clue what an acceptable exposure would be, they decided because of lawsuits to ban the products, then a limit of zero tolerance was adopted. The limit setting was totally pick a wild number out of the air.

What is really happening in a sort of twisting of facts to fit a particular marketing type demand for particular services. The missing part is still any type of valid proof or relationship of certain exposures to any real damage.
They use whatever spin required to get the results desired. At some point every house is probably going to have to meet whatever limit that in needed to get the business. The driving forces here are not science, not medical but a type of business model.

Many other scenarios with all sorts of dangers, real or imagined are also in the process of being pushed to make the World "Safe". The housing market is pure gold if you get the right conditions. It represents the biggest concentration of wealth for the average bear. When somebody starts to push ZERO as a limit, understand what is coming your way soon.

The total dollars involved are way, way into the billions. Sort of reminds you of some of the pill pushing schemes. They now try to get the "Consumers" to demand a product to create......... A-Yup even more demand for a product. Wouldn't it be nice to get the claims validated first???