In the annals of nuclear accidents Fukushima has a special place. In Chernobyl the government opted to remove the 116,000 people living around the power plant. In Fukushima there is an ongoing effort to remove the contamination and to bring the 154,000 evacuees back. The Japanese government claims the effort is successful – independent researchers have serious doubts.
Admittedly the cleanup so far reached only 5 percent of Fukushima province and the only published data on the status of radioactive substances come from independent researchers. They find that contamination returned to cleaned up areas via wind, rain and traffic.
Norma Field is an author and professor emeritus of East Asian studies at the University of Chicago. She has taught Premodern Japanese Poetry and Prose, and Gender Studies. She is a frequent visitor to Japan where she was born in 1947.
Norma Field spoke for NEIS on December 2, 2017. The Nuclear Energy Information Service, NEIS, had invited her and Arnie Gundersen to call attention to the plight of people who suffer the consequences of radiation.
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