Female Nuke Worker Mortality Probed

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

As posted on Powernet by Mike Russell

JUNE 29, 20:28 EDT

Female Nuke Worker Mortality Probed  

WASHINGTON (AP)  Working in the nuclear weapons industry 
during the Cold War may not have been any more dangerous for 
women than other jobs, unless they were exposed frequently to 
radiation, a study of thousands of female defense workers 
suggests.  

The study, conducted for the government by a private researcher, 
examined mortality rates among nearly 68,000 women who worked 
at 12 nuclear weapons plants or related companies between the 
1940s and 1980.  

The study found that the mortality rate generally was no higher for 
these workers when compared with other women and, in some 
cases, was lower than had been expected.  

The author, epidemiologist Gregg Wilkinson of the State University 
of New York-Buffalo, said that the study found ``nothing alarming'' 
among the general group of women who worked in the weapons 
plants.  

``We did see an increase risk of leukemia'' and a higher incidence 
of breast cancer and other cancers among women exposed to 
external radiation, even low levels for long periods of time, 
Wilkinson said. He said the findings ``were still based on a 
relatively small number'' of deaths.  

About a third of the women, or 21,440 who worked at 10 sites, 
were believed to have been exposed to external radiation as part of 
their jobs. A higher than expected number of deaths from leukemia 
was seen among these workers, the study said.  

The researchers found that between the 1940s and 1993, there 
were 13,671 deaths among the female workers, or about 4,435 
fewer than would be expected from a similar sized group in the 
general population.  

These numbers suggest that the death rate among female nuclear 
workers was not much different than other among other groups of 
workers, the report said.  

But the nuclear workers did have higher incidences of death from 
mental disorder, diseases related to the genital and urinary organs 
and ``ill-defined conditions,'' said the study, conducted under a 
contract with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and 
Health and also for the Energy Department.  

``This is an important contribution to our understanding of the 
mortality rates of our department's past female nuclear weapons 
workers about which in the past very little information was known,'' 
the Energy Department said in a statement.  

The nuclear weapons sites studied were:  

Tennessee's Oak Ridge compound, which includes the K-25 
Gaseous Diffusion Plant, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and the Y-
12 Plant.  

Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

The Zia Company, which provided security at Los Alamos during the 1940s.

Rocky Flats in Colorado.

Hanford reservation in Washington state.

Ohio's Mound and Fernald plants.

South Carolina's Savannah River complex.

Texas' Pantex plant.

The Linde facility in New York, which closed in 1949.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle					Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   				    	
Director, Technical				Extension 2306 				     	
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Division		Fax:(714) 668-3149 	                   		    
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Costa Mesa, CA 92626

Personal Website:  http://www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/1205
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com
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