Friday, November 19, 2004

Home Office stalls on weapons scanner health risks / The Register, 18 Nov 2004

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/11/18/blunkett_xray_blank/
John Lettice
"Are your children being irradiated? Are you being irradiated? The UK Home Office seems unconcerned by the question, despite being responsible for at least one of the government organisations wielding the devices that might be doing the irradiating. Weapons scanners that use x-rays are now being tested by the Metropolitan Police and at Heathrow airport, and while the effect of a single scan will probably be negligible, the actual health risk will depend on the nature of the particular deployments, and on the individuals being scanned. So they should therefore not be deployed casually, without careful prior consideration, on the basis that they're 'harmless'."