Popular protests by parents pressure Japanese government to reinstate stronger radiation protections for children

The L.A. Times has reported that a growing movement, led by parents, protesting the Japanese federal government's decision to allow a 20-fold increase in "permissible" radiation exposures for children -- in order to enable contaminated schools downwind of the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe to stay open -- has been reversed. The Japanese Ministry of Education has announced that "permissible" radiation exposure limits for children at school will be returned from 20 milliSieverts per year (2 Rem/yr) to 1 mSv/yr (100 millirem/yr). 2 Rem/yr is equivalent to what the German federal government allows German nuclear power plant workers to receive, a level for children that Physicians for Social Responsibility has called "unconscionable."