As Japan’s nuclear crisis continues to fester with no sign of letting up (at the time of writing, the latest worries centered radioactive water leaking into the sea) and now Chinese authorities have announced testing for radiation in the food and drinking water of 14 places, including Beijing and Tianjin, according to the China Daily.

The announcement comes on the heels of a confirmation that the “level of radiation stemming from iodine-131, a radioactive isotope, was higher than usual in four counties in Northeast China's Heilongjiang province” as well as restrictions on certain Japanese food imports. Nevertheless authorities have reiterated that the detected levels of radiation are too low to pose any public health risk.

Olivia Lee (a.k.a. The Nutritioneer) and Dr Richard have both shared an illustrated map from Der Speigel showing a "time lapse time-lapse of the Japanese radiation exposure headed mostly east, over the Pacific, and not westerly towards China."

The People's Daily has also run a report claiming that "no abnormalities have been found in China radiation monitoring."

For now, at least , it seems Beijingers can exhale and stop clutching their iodine bottles.

We already wrote a post about what we can do to aid Japan’s tsunami-quake victims, but more of the Beijing community is pulling together to line up charity events for the next few weeks. Read on to see how to join the cause.

Last week’s devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan has hit close to home on many, many levels. Here are some more ways to help from Beijing:

Online donations can be made via Chinapay to the Red Cross Society of China by visiting the English language page and filling out the form.

You can also wire money from the post office located in Beixinqiao in Dongcheng District (东城区北新桥三条八号) using the customer account number (客户号) 111119995.

Japan’s devastating tsunami-quake-nuclear crisis may be old news by now, but the alarming number of super-tremblors that have wreaked havoc around the world in recent years should be enough to make anyone wary of an earth-shattering catastrophe occurring in their own backyard.

China, of course, has seen its share of death and destruction over the centuries – after all, much of the country sits on the “junctions of several tectonic plates, including the Pacific, the Eurasian and the Indian Ocean plates with at least 495 faults crisscrossing its topography.” Scientists recently determined that at least 130 of these fault lines lie beneath major cities, including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, but also pointed out that 80 of the are “inactive” (though this may not be so reassuring considering the unspecified nature of the other 40 and this NYT report on how scientists have historically underestimated the power of earthquakes).