Health Impacts of Ionizing Radiation Pertaining to Nuclear Weapons Scientific and Technical Basics

The Nuclear Truth Project is proud to present a specially commissioned report written by Arjun Makhijani PhD on Health Impacts of Ionizing Radiation Pertaining to Nuclear Weapons Scientific and Technical Basics

Preface

This report addresses the scientific basics of the impact of ionizing radiation on health in the context of nuclear weapons and power. It is not meant to be an analysis or even a compendium of the actual health impacts.

There is a voluminous literature about health impacts of nuclear weapons production and testing, including three major works jointly produced by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War and the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IPPNW and IEER 1991, IPPNW and IEER 1992, and IPPNW and IEER 2000). There are also eleven reports, one for each major nuclear weapons test site, produced by IEER for the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.1 Of course, there is also a great deal of other literature, including by the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) and in peer-reviewed journals.

The aim of this report is to provide a succinct, basic scientific resource on the topic. It is focused on low-dose ionizing radiation, and therefore primarily on stochastic effects. The report also explores some issues that have been understudied even though they have major implications for understanding and evaluating the health impacts of ionizing radiation. The issues related to high dose exposure are well established and not revisited here. Internal references are omitted in the quotations.

This report was produced for the Nuclear Truth Project. This is a companion report on remediation of nuclear contamination (Makhijani 2026a) and one on multigenerational impacts of ionizing radiation (Makhijani 2026), both also prepared for the Nuclear Truth Project. This report was funded by a generous donor who wishes to remain anonymous.

Arjun Makhijani July 2026