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Show Page 24 The Ogden Valley News Volume I, Issue IX June 1999 SHEEP (cont.) from page 23 to question the safety of the atmospheric tests of the past. Numerous surfacing health problems and cancers began to counter the AEC’s claim that the public had been protected. This public whispering of concern was soon muted. The AEC convinced President Johnson to bury the Weiss reports and research beyond public reach. We were left alone in the dark with our ill and dying family, friends and neighbors all about us. The nuclear testing, by now moved underground, was not to be compromised. Pandora’s box remained open. The Significance of Caged Canaries Pausing for a moment, I searched the face of my friend. Probably for the first time in her life, I was asking her to question the integrity of our government whose honored foundation rivaled that of the LDS Church. She had always been a devout Mormon — I the heathen. We both had been raised in an atmosphere where authority was not questioned, church or state. Patriotism had forever run high. I was asking her to consider the probability that she had been harmed by governmental decisions which had placed little value upon our lives. As babies and small children, our mothers had never been alerted to take precautions with our milk or food, or to shelter us inside during times of fallout. In the whole scheme of nuclear matters, the concern for our welfare had become lost. The reality of it all delivers a shock which defies comprehension. She and I had become expendable. She nodded for me to continue. On September 16, 1998, the U.S. Senate, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Of the Committee on Governmental Affairs convened to examine the National Cancer Institute’s management of an important scientific study. This study is known as “Estimated Exposures and Thyroid Doses Received by the American People from Iodine-131 in Fallout Following Nevada Atmospheric Nuclear Bomb Tests, a Report from the National Cancer Institute.” The legislated intent of this government study was to provide the public with complete information on both the amount and effects of radioactive Iodine-131 and other radionuclides released into the atmosphere during the nuclear weapons testing at the Nevada Test Site. Testing which yielded three to four times the amount of Iodine-131 released from the Chernobyl reactor accident, approximately 200 times that released from Hanford and about 5,000 times the Iodine-131 released at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Ironically, our nation had chastised the former Soviet Union for not quickly alerting neighboring countries of the spreading contamination emitted by the Chernobyl disaster. The Senators present at this hearing were Senators John Glenn and Richard J. Durbin, with Senator Susan M. Collins presiding. This hearing was the result of an investigation initiated and led by the Ranking Minority Member, the distinguished Senator from Ohio, Senator John Glenn. Controversy had been swirling around the National Cancer Institute’s (NCI) study since its final release in October, 1997 — a study which had inexplicably taken 14 years to complete. Senator John Glenn and his staff had discovered that the NCI study had been “plagued by trouble with management, lack of internal oversight and lack of public participation and openness.” Similar problems which were also evident with NCI’s participation in ongoing and critical studies of the Chernobyl disaster. The investigation not only disclosed how NCI’s work on the Iodine-131 report proved to be a prime example on how not to conduct research, but also exposed the troubling fact that after 14 years, grave concern should not be spent on what the report did contain, but on what it did not. The NCI’s study had essentially failed the congressional mandate it had been directed to fulfill. Therefore, the public was not to receive vital information in regards to fallout because of this failure. Senator John Glenn expressed dismay: “Once again, it would appear that the government has dropped the ball in this case, and citizens who were unknowingly or unwillingly exposed to fallout are again victims of unacceptable bureaucratic indifference or neglect.” By way of background, Congress passed, in 1983, an amendment to the Orphan Drug Act requiring the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to assess and publicly divulge not only the amount and effects of the radioactive Iodine-131 (I-131) and all major radionuclides, but also address all potential cancers. Section 7 of the Orphan Drug Act, Public Law 97-414, originated as an amendment by Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah. Section 7 consists of two subparts, (a) and (b). Section (a) requires the estimation of the doses of I-131 incurred by American citizens from the atmospheric nuclear bomb tests. This Section also requires the calculation of thyroid cancer risks based upon these doses of I-131 received. Section (b) called for the development and publication of epidemiological tables that would be inclusive of all radiogenic cancers and show a probability of causation of developing each radiation related cancer due to exposure to the radioactive releases of the Nevada Test Site. In July and August of 1997, newspapers across the nation carried the preliminary release of the NCI study. It was disclosed that virtually every county in the continental U.S.A. had been exposed to fallout from the Nevada Test Site (NTS). Counties receiving the highest “rads” of I-131 were highlighted and their “doses” were published. Information on exposures and doses were provided by NCI in their report and on their web site. Information which was basically useless to the American public. In order to comprehend the implications of the doses to which individuals in each county were exposed, estimates of health risk associated with each does needed to be presented (for example, in a percent form). This was not done. Citizens were reading numbers expressed in rads with no idea of what impact these numbers might mean to their health. Further, unless an individual was a statician, engineer or scientist, the data presented was incomprehensible. The results in the NCI report and on the web page were cloaked in geometric mean (GM), geometric standard deviation (GSD) and in scientific notation “E” format. Uncertainty in the dose estimates were not clearly communicated. The NCI report had partially failed Section 7(a) of the mandate. The failure by the NCI to address Section 7(b) in their report victimizes the American public in a manner which is almost beyond description. Radioactive I-131 was only one of the potpourri of fission products, or range of biologically significant radionuclides, broadcast by the NTS bomb tests. Testing which continued with emissions until at least March 22, 1986 with the confirmed venting of the shaft test named “Glencoe.” Testing which resulted in 100 atmospheric tests and an entire series of 828 underground tests. The last test at the NTS was “Divider” on September 23, 1992. Testimony and posed questions documented within the written record, in regard to the hearing on the NCI study, unveiled the troubling significance of excluded information by the NCI. By neglecting to assess the doses of the additional radionuclides and to establish the risk for all radiogenic cancers from exposure to any of these radioactive substances, the American people and their children were denied information relevant to their present and future health and welfare. By presenting only one radionuclide, I-131, and touting the 95% five-year survival rate of thyroid cancer, citizens were unwittingly lulled into the belief that fallout from the NTS presented little harm to America’s people. Because of the NCI study, many have wrongly concluded that in respect to the nuclear testing, individuals are no longer in harm’s way. Only the dead are beyond reach. When addressing the potential impact of the radioactive fallout from the NTS, consideration must be given to the time aspect of the term “risk”. During the hearing before the Subcommittee, Senator Durbin desired to know the normal period of time thyroid cancer would exhibit itself following exposure. Dr. Lybarger, Director of ATSDR’s Division of Health Studies, replied as follows: “Senator, the risk increases to a general level of around 40 years. It does not decrease after that period of time. So, generally, it is a life-long risk of extra cancer.” For example, if a 5-year-old child experienced exposure to radioactive fallout from the 1986 “Glencoe” test, thyroid cancer could, therefore, occur any time between 1986 to 2026 with the cancer risk leveling off after the year 2026, but never decreasing. This child would also bear for the remainder of his or her life, the risks for other cancers from exposure to the numerous, undisclosed radionuclides accompanying I-131. Due to the restrictive information released by the NCI, this same child would not be alerted to expand the continual monitoring for cancer beyond the region of the neck as age progressed. To further expand upon this term, the risk to a population from fallout is not controlled by the average or overall collective dose as published in newspapers or on the NCI web site. The gender and age of an individual at the time of exposure are very important determinants of risk, even more so than are dose, diet and location. The population at greatest risk was and is young children — most of who would be less than 5 years of age at the time of exposure. The very young female population often exhibit more effects of exposure to radioactive fallout than their male counterpart. Therefore, a young female child living in an eastern state could sustain a low dose of radioactive I-131, and yet be at a higher level of risk than an adult male living in a county near the test site and receiving a higher dose. Suffering exposure, the bodies of young female children would later serve as delicate barometers to a hidden, unnatural shift in a once nurturing environment. This information was not clearly communicated to the general public. The discussion of risk also makes unavoidable the mention of the delayed health effects associated with exposure to radioactive particles. Due to the 1998 Subcommittee hearing, Tim Connor, on behalf of the Advisory Committee for Energy Related Epidemiologic Research (ACERER), submitted a report to the record which clearly addressed the delayed effects of radioactivity. Mr. Connor wrote, on September 27, 1998: . . . Fallout particles drifted and rained down from the sky to irradiate on contact, to be inhaled, and to be ingested in water, milk, and foodstuffs. Today, the best scientific evidence supports the conclusion that the delayed effects of radioactive fallout were likely harmful to tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people. Because of the latency between exposure and the onset of cancer and other diseases, the risks for these injuries continue to this day. A focus should be heavily placed upon the words “cancer,” “other diseases” and “the risks for these injuries continue to this day.” Humans near and far continue to be unknowing participants to an American tragedy as health problems lie dormant, waiting to emerge. In 1997, adults were nervously engaged in mathematics because in accommodating the NCI Iodine-131 study, major newspapers reported that the main group at risk “are people who were under age 20 during the fallout years.” Those between the ages of 35 and 65 in 1997 were targeted as the group at risk. By this account, the public was asked to believe the CONTINUED on page 25 |
