If you were a scientist you would have quantified the risk. This statement is almost meaningless.
There is natural radiation all around us. Like:
- Cosmic Rays, which can vary depending on altitude, like say Boulder, Co
- Radon
- Radioactivity from Potasisum-40 and Carbon-14
- Rocks, soil
That comes to 2.33 mSv per year
Source: Page 89 of "Megawatts + Megatons" (not Wikipedia)
This is the type of comment that spreads public misconception. Do you start not going out for work, exercises, and fun, because there is never zero risk to get run over a car?
You can take any risk you want. Do you have the right to subject to these risks others?
The mutation rate at low doses is linear. You get more mutations from higher dose. The damage of natural radioactivity and human created sources just adds up.
Thank you for asking. The most trusted model estimates that the incidence of cancers as a result of ionizing radiation grows linearly with effective radiation dose at a rate of 5.5% per sievert*. I hope that helps.
*"The 2007 Recommendations of the International Commission on Radiological Protection". Annals of the ICRP. ICRP publication 103 37 (2-4). 2007. ISBN 978-0-7020-3048-2.
You are aware that 1 Sievert is a LETHAL dose of radiation for humans, so worrying about 5.5% increase in mutation risk is moot. This is one of the case when tests on lab animals yield meaningless numbers for humans...
Sievert is just an easy unit to use in the discussion. What you really want to say is that only a small percentage of particularly weak people will suffer from the additional cancer. That is a good news. The bad part is that soon (after some age) everyone of us will become the particularly weak person easily succumbing to the cancer.
There is no minimal safe dose of radiation. It induces mutations with a linear rate right out of the zero millisievierts. The mutations produce cancer and other maladies.
It takes decades for cancer to develop. This allows plenty of time for some people with no real biology knowledge run in circles with the good news.