Estimation of children's thyroid equivalent doses in 16 municipalities after the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station accident

Suzuki, Gen*; Ishikawa, Tetsuo*; Oba, Takashi*; Hasegawa, Arifumi*; Nagai, Haruyasu  ; Miyatake, Hirokazu*; Yoshizawa, Nobuaki*

To elucidate the association between radiation dose and thyroid cancer after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (FDNPS) accident, it is essential to estimate individual thyroid equivalent doses (TEDs) to children. In a previous study, we reported a methodology for reconstructing TEDs from inhalation based on individual behavioural survey sheets combined with a spatiotemporal radionuclides database constructed by an atmospheric transport, diffusion, and deposition model (ATDM). In the present study, we further refined our methodology and estimated the combined TEDs from inhalation and ingestion among children in 16 municipalities around the nuclear power station utilizing 3,256 individual whereabouts questionnaire survey sheets. Distributions of estimated TEDs were similar to estimates based on direct thyroid measurements in 1080 children in Iwaki City, Kawamata Town, Iitate Village, and Minamisoma City. Mean TEDs in 1-year-old children ranged from 1.3 mSv in Date City to 14.9 mSv in Odaka Ward in Minamisoma City, and the 95th percentiles varied from 2.3 mSv in Date City to 28.8 mSv in Namie Town. In the future, this methodology can be useful for a case-control study of thyroid cancer after the FDNPS accident.