Can people get poisoned by indirect exposure to polonium-210?

On Thursday, November 23, former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko died in a London hospital of radiation poisoning. Doctors determined that he'd been given a lethal dose of the radioactive isotope polonium-210, which they found in his urine before he died. Since then, authorities have found traces of radiation, in most cases openly attributed to polonium-210, in at least 10 places known to have been visited by the victim after he began feeling ill on November 1. The sites include Litvinenko's home, one restaurant, a hotel, the office suite of a security company and the office of one of Litvinenko's friends. In addition, scientists have found traces of radiation in two British Airways jets that had flown routes between London and Moscow in the weeks before Litvinenko's death. Ripples of concern have spread through Britain: Are the tens of thousands of people who were in those buildings or on those planes in the last month at risk of radiation poisoning?

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