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S R THE SOCIETY FOR eat your vegetables. Ema
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RADIOLOGICAL PROTECTION
SRP Posters for Schools See our website for more free to download resources.
www.srp-uk.org/public-and-schools/resources-for-schools Risks in Perspective – Poster 2

Risks of life ...

Many things we do affect our lives.
Some things help us live longer...
But some things make us die earlier.

MICROLIFE
A MICROLIFE is a unit of risk representing half an hour change of life expectancy
Get Positive microlives and you live longer
Get Negative microlives and you die earlier

You get negative microlives from activities such as: You get positive microlives from activities such as:
Smoking, drinking too much alcohol, Eating healthily (5-a-day), exercising,
eating too much fatty food, not exercising. living in 'clean' environment.

As a UK teenager you have about a million microlives left before you die.

0 0 , 0 0 0 Everyday you use up 48 microlives (that's 24 hours) just by living!

/ day
1, 0 BUT we are leading healthier lifestyles and our healthcare system is always improving,
so each day we gain a few microlives back and live a little longer. 48

Positive and Negative Microlives Microlives ALL these activities result in

per day minus 1 microlife per day
Living in 2013 rather than 1913 + 15 Smoking 2 cigarettes
Being female rather than male +4 Watching 2 hours of television
Eating your '5-a-day' fruit and vegetables +4 Radiation from eating 600 bananas
Half an hour moderate exercise per day +1 Being 5 kg overweight
2 cups of coffee a day +1 Radiation from eating a bag of brazil nuts
Having just one alcoholic drink a day +1 Eating one portion of red meat
Radiation dose from one transatlantic flight
Drinking another 2 alcoholic drinks a day -1
Eating one portion of red meat -1 The Government values a microlife at about £1.70 (they will spend
Radiation dose from one transatlantic flight -1 no more than £1.70 to save you one microlife)

Being male rather than female -4 For every 17,500 negative microlives
Smoking 20 cigarettes a day - 10 you lose one year of your life expectancy

Thanks to Sir David Spiegelhalter OBE FRS, Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk, University of Cambridge for assistance in preparing this poster

+44 (0)1803 866743 admin@srp-uk.org www.srp-uk.org SRPUK @SRP_UK

IRPA
Incorporated by Royal Charter 2007 The UK Associate Society Affiliated to Registered Charity in England & Wales No 1122804