WASHINGTON, Dec. 29 (UPI) -- An estimated 14,000 excess U.S.
deaths may be linked to the radioactive fallout from the
Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, two researchers say. Study
authors epidemiologist Joseph Mangano, executive director of the
Radiation and Public Health Project, and Dr. Janette Sherman, an
adjunct professor at Western Michigan University, said six days
after the nuclear reactor meltdowns struck four reactors at
Fukushima March 11, scientists detected the plume of toxic
fallout had arrived over American shores. The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency found levels of radiation in air, water and
milk hundreds of times above normal across the United States,
the researchers said. Mangano said the normal level of
Iodine-131 in U.S. precipitation was about 2 picocuries
Iodine-131 per liter of water, but the highest detected levels
of Iodine-131 in precipitation were: Boise, Idaho, 390; Kansas
City, 200; Salt Lake City, 190; Jacksonville, Fla., 150;
Olympia, Wash., 125; and Boston, 92. "This stu