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Airport full body scanners use a radiation called terahertz wave radiation (THz).  A Los Alamos National Laboratory study reports that these waves “unzip” DNA, which creates “bubbles” in the DNA’s double strand that “may interfere with gene expression and DNA replication”.  In short, increased cancer risk.  The Transport Security Administration (TSA) has, to date, not released the radiation inspection reports requested by Congress.

The reasoning by the TSA is that they require time to review the reports to ensure there is no “sensitive security or privacy-protected information”.  What can be sensitive or private about reports that monitor radiation?  The TSA will tell you that the radiation dose from the scanner is “tiny — equivalent to what a person receives during two minutes inside an airplane at cruising altitude”.  But pertinent question is what kind of radiation?  Radiation at high altitudes is “cosmic ionizing radiation” and the risk is minimal.

There’s more, of course, in support of the LANL study.  Physics professor Peter Rez says that the THz radiation dose in the scanners is 10 times higher than the Department of Homeland Security claims.  USA Today reported that one billion full-body scans per year in the U.S. “may profoundly change the potential public health consequences”.  UCSF scientists report that if the scanner softwar fails, a passenger inside the scanner could receive “severe burns, if not worse”.  Lastly, the human element always adds risk.  A CDC a few years ago found that baggage xray machines sometimes emitted excess radiation with no one the wiser.  The scanners had missing or disabled safety features.