The in vivo measurement of radiocaesium activity in broiler chickens

Contamination of certain areas of Europe with radiocaesium from the Chernobyl accident led to a higher 137Cs accumulation (i.e. 300–600 Bq kg−1) in grain and to potential post-accident contamination of broiler chickens. In future, such contamination may require a simple determination of the 137Cs activity concentration in broiler chicken meat which would lead to measures for preventing the recommended limits of radionuclide contamination of the meat for human consumption from being exceeded. This paper describes the development of a rapid method for the in vivo monitoring of the broiler chicken using a lead-shielded sodium iodide detector. The method enables simply fixed live chicken to be monitored, the results showing a good correlation (R2=0.98) with measurements of meat from chicken previously monitored in vivo prior to slaughter.