Potassium Iodide

Potassium iodide is flying off the shelves. Nothing like the threat of nuclear war to help sales along. A lot of people are buying it because they know it's supposed to protect against radiation. It doesn't, exactly. What it does is flood your thyroid gland not allowing it to uptake radioactive iodine isotopes. Since your thyroid gland is “full” there's no room for the radioactive bits to get in.

Thyroid protection is good, but that's all it does. Not only that, there are potential side effects, nausea, diarrhea, headache, depression and potential allergic reactions. You should research the full range of possible problems.

Potassium iodide does not protect against other radioactive particles. Is it worth getting? That's up to you. As for myself I've keep some in my home and vehicles for years. At the time I was more concerned about malfunctioning nuclear power plants. After all, we've had Chernobyl and Fukushima. I don't consider it unreasonable to protect against a type of disaster that's happened twice.

Unfortunately, you'll probably pay top dollar for the pills now. It's up to you to decide if they are worth having or not. I bought some because there are so few ways to mitigate radiation poisoning that any little bit helps.

Wikipedia has a pretty good introduction to Potassium Iodide. Unlike many sources of information, they aren't trying to see you any pills, so they are worth checking out.

-Sixbears