Extremely high Radon levels

[AnxietySufferer]

Hello,

I am a long time lurker, but have not posted for many years as mostly my health anxiety has been in a better place.

I moved into a basement flat around 5 months ago in a high radon area. I did a 3 month radon test (you have to be living at the property to get accurate results). I recently got these back and the bedroom got a result of 2100 Bq m-3 (200 is the action level so this is EXTEMELY high) even the living room got 800Bq m-3 which is still very high. I spend a lot of time in the flat due to working from home.

Obviously, I am going to look at getting a mitigation system, but I don’t know how to stop the health anxiety making me feel like it’s already too late and I’m going to get lung cancer from this. I also don’t know how long it will take to sort the mitigation system, or whether it will be possible to get this down to reasonable levels so I am feeling very stressed and wondered if anyone else has had a similar experience?

Based on these stats https://health.mo.gov/living/environment/radon/riskcharts.php , if I was exposed to these high levels for a lifetime it would be around a 10% risk of cancer, which is quite high but I am trying to remind myself that this is lifetime exposure not 6 months, but my anxiety is through the roof trying to sleep knowing the levels are so high.

[ErinKC]

So I was curious and did some research and found a study that showed the threshold levels are likely way below what they have to be and 2100 is closer to where the actual threshold is. So, while you were exposed to that level, it’s possible that’s not really as high above safe as other metrics show. And most places say it’s like 20 years of exposure that increases your risk. I’d just proceed with remediation and try not to let it consume you too much.