So, What About Food and Radiation?

Now that the immediate dangers from the tsunami/earthquake disaster are no longer pressing issues, the next great danger is probably contaminated soil and sea water: not because we are walking on that soil or swimming in that water, but because land and sea is where our food comes from. Is anything safe to eat?

Tomoko Otake of the Japan Times published an excellent article on September 20 addressing this very topic. Here are some of the highlights:

1. Wash your vegetables and fruits. Radioactive Iodine is no longer a big threat, as its half life of 8 days has already passed. But Cesium and Strontium remain. The good news? These radioactive substances dissolve. They can be washed off. Throw away the outer lettuce and cabbage leaves. Peel what can be peeled. Wash what can be washed.

2. Forget about brown rice for a while. The outer, brown layer of the rice grain is where the danger lies. These days, white rice is best. Soak it before cooking it, and throw away the water in which it was soaked and washed.

3. Bread and pasta are safe options. The wheat they are made from mostly comes from overseas.

4. Fish: hmmm. If they are smallish fish that were swimming around the contaminated area (because small fish do not have what it takes to travel far), better pass.

5. Meat: cook it.

6. Wakame and other edible sea veggies: find out where they are from. Wakame was briefly sought after because it is full of iodine that, if ingested, pre-empts the space that the radioactive iodine might have taken in the thyroid gland etc. However, if that wakame was grown in contaminated water, it will have absorbed the contaminants. Wash it. Soak it.