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The Department of Homeland Security is about to deploy X-ray devices to allow screeners to see beneath a passenger's clothes. The ACLU is crying, "Foul!" The device gives a clear and detailed image of the passenger's naked body. The ACLU claims that it is a virtual strip search, and allowing it's use would be a step on the road to a surveillance society. The Department of Homeland Security says they don't want to get bogged down in endless debates about privacy issues. They intend to go ahead.

What about the radiation? We are living longer lives, meaning we are exposed to radiation more. We have greater life-long exposure to natural radiation. We also have greater exposure to medical radiation. We get more annual chest X-rays per life than when we died younger. Don't forget routine dental X-rays. Since we are living longer, we are also having more imaging ordered for specific diagnostic purposes.

Even though each of these man-made forms of radiation has been engineered with fewer rads actually used per imaging procedure, there is still an accumulation. Radiation, as we know, causes cancer. Risk of cancer is figured on the basis of total lifetime exposure. The more the exposure, the greater the risk.

There is also a "one-hit" theory of cancer. It says that a single exposure to a single unit of a cancer-causing agent can alter a single living cell in your body, and that altered cell could start reproducing forming a cancer. This means you really should try to completely avoid things that cause cancer. For medical imaging, there is some health benefit to offset the health risk.

There is no health benefit to offset the health risk of the X-Ray scanners, no matter how low the dose of radiation. Don't be fooled: it takes years, and sometimes decades before an exposure leads to a cancer. Homeland Security cannot guarantee us that these four-year-old devices with limited testing are safe.

It could come to pass that they will argue the device is safe because it generates less radiation than some other standard. Sometimes people liken radiation exposure to time in the sun. We are supposed to wear sunscreen because radiation from the sun causes skin cancer. Remember, the goal is to limit total lifetime radiation exposure.

So, will the CDC find, in the year 2040, that people who were frequent travelers have a higher risk of developing certain types of cancer? We don't know what these machines will do, but it will be unhealthy. It is simply a question of degree. So, get your frequent-flyer miles and get your frequent-flyer rads, too!