As a frequent business traveler, Melissa Wilson might be expected to pass through new full-body imaging machines at security checkpoints in airports around the country. Instead, Wilson tells USA Today, she has gone through none at all.
The Florida management consultant says, "I've been screened zero times, and that number will remain zero."
Rather than use the new full-body imaging machines, she submits to screenings by metal detectors and pat-downs by airport security personnel. Like a number of other frequent fliers, Wilson is concerned about the cumulative effect of repeated exposure to the radiation emitted by the airport x-ray security systems.
No Need to Worry?
The Transportation Security Administration (TSA), which hopes to have 1,000 of the new screening devices in place by the end of 2011, reassures fliers that there is no need to worry.
A TSA spokesperson told USA Today that the high-speed x-rays emit low doses of radiation, equal to the amount of radiation a person is exposed to in two minutes in flight. Other screening devices emit electromagnetic waves "thousands of times less than what is permitted for a cell phone," the spokesperson told the newspaper.
Earlier this year, four University of California professors wrote a letter to President Obama's top science and technology advisor voicing "serious concerns" about possible health dangers posed by the devices to the public. The professors specialize in x-ray imaging, cancer, biochemistry and biophysics.
"The dose [of radiation] to the skin may be dangerously high," they wrote. They stated that they believe the full-body scanners' radiation increases the threat of cancer to children, pregnant women, senior citizens and others at risk.
Significant Risk
The director of Columbia University's radiological research center, David Brenner, says he thinks the machines pose a low risk to individuals, but acknowledges that because hundreds of millions of people fly every year, the full-body screeners pose a real risk to the population: "The population risk has the potential to be significant."
When you fly, you have the right to ask for an alternate form of screening that will not expose you to x-rays or electromagnetic waves. For those who worry about the danger of skin cancer or other health risks, the alternate screenings clearly pose less of a threat to your health and the health of your family.
If overexposure to x-rays or other harmful forms of radiation have harmed you or a member of your family needlessly, contact a North Carolina personal injury lawyer for an assessment of your case.
