RE: Compensation of survivors

["Dukelow, James S Jr" <jim.dukelow@PNL.GOV>]

One thing missing from this discussion is a recognition of the basis for the

compensation program.  Politically, it was the product of an informal coalition

of congressman and senators from districts with DOE facilities, with the initial

impetus coming from the office of the DOE Assistant Secretary for EH&S, David

Michael, who before his appointment to DOE was an anti-nuclear activist.



The "scientific" basis for the program was a report summarizing the results of

dozens of epidemiological studies of DOE workers.  A "piece of trash" review

draft of the report was leaked to Matthew Wald of the NYTimes, who must be one

of the world's most credulous journalists.  Wald's story set off the political

firestorm the led eventually to the compensation program.  A few months after

the leaking of the review draft, the final report was released.  It was better,

but the body of the report put a spin on the results that is not supported by

the detailed data tables in the appendices.  Those data support the conclusion

that DOE workers, on average, are significantly healthier than the general

public, showing a "healthy worker" effect found in many epidemiological studies

of worker populations.



I hasten to add that there were some practices at some AEC/ERDA/DOE and

contractor facilities that I consider completely unacceptable.  I consider a

carefully targeted compensation program to be a reasonable response.



Best regards.



Jim Dukelow

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Richland, WA

jim.dukelow@pnl.gov



These comments are mine and have not been reviewed and/or approved by my

management or by the U.S. Department of Energy.



-----Original Message-----

From: BERNARD L COHEN [mailto:blc+@PITT.EDU]

Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2001 9:21 AM

To: Simmons, Michael

Cc: 'RuthWeiner@AOL.COM'; StokesJ@TTNUS.COM; OGCRegulations@mail.va.gov;

radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu

Subject: RE: Compensation of survivors







On Thu, 16 Aug 2001, Simmons, Michael wrote:



> Ruth and others-

> 

> Here is another perspective on the whole compensation issue:

> 

> On June 14, 1957 a chemical explosion involving Pu nitrate occurred at Rocky



	--No one is saying that a worker injured in an occupational

accident should not be taken care of. They are covered by Workman

Compensation, which has been the law of the land for many decades. There

are about 10,000 deaths every year in U.S. from work-related accidents,

and these are normally well compensated, to the best of my knowledge. What

is the point of the story of the worker injured in a Pu explosion 44 years

ago?

	Incidently, there is no reason to believe that prostate cancer is

caused by plutonium in the body. Nearly all the plutonium deposits in the

liver and bone where it is retained for many years - that is the risk from

plutonium.



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