> Unfortunately, radiation lends itself very well to sensationalism
It's strange, but it wasn't always this way. If you look back into older literature, there was a sense that radioactive things would bring about a bright, promising future. So much so that people did some pretty crazy things (at least, knowing what we know now) like those foot x-rays that shoe stores once gave (which caused some pretty high radiation exposure), or those "health" drinks that got people to drink Radium water a long time ago[1].
But once the problems came to light along with the fears of nuclear war and the demonstration of the power of atomic weapons, radiation became something to be feared, even irrationally much. I really hope that things even out over time, so that we fear it neither too much nor too little. It certainly can be dangerous. There were even some really scary criticality accidents[2] with people working on the cores to nuclear bombs. But at the same time, people point out that we don't have to fear every bit of radiation. After all, there's plenty of natural background radiation all around us, from bananas to Brazil nuts.
I wish that we could come up with a happy medium, but I think it will require a lot of time and education.
[1] If you want to see the Radium water, read this: http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2004-08/healthy-glow-d...
[2] The "walking ghost" phase after massive exposure is especially creepy. More info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticality_accident