Re: Compensation of survivors -Veteran human experiments

[SAFarberMSPH@CS.COM]

> On Thu, 16 Aug 2001, Stokes, James wrote:


> > 
>
> > >  First of all, I am not talking about soldiers who die in wartime
>
> > > situations. I was in the military for many years myself.  I can tell you
>
> > > though, that some military personnel WERE used in experiments,without 
>
> their
>
> > > knowledge.
>
> > 
>
> >     --I know about those involved in bomb tests; their exposures were
>
> > quite small, and no excess cancers were found among them. I would be
>
> > interested in being told about other cases.
>
> > 
>
> >     <snip>
>
> > 


==========




Radsafe:

Concerning "other" human radiation experiments on military personnel, the DoD 

issued a 2 volume report in Aug. 1997 reviewing about 2,000 experiments it 

had evaluated as part of the investigation begun under the Executive Order of 

Jan 1994 which organized the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation 

Experiments [ACHRE] mentioned as part of this thread by Bernie Cohen.


The DoD made a determination that only one human experiment it conducted 

involved sufficient radiation risk to warrant medical notice and followup 

actions. This one experiment involved the use of Nasal Radium Irradiation 

[NRI]  of submariners conducted on submariner trainees at Groton, CT during 

1945 under Project X-434. The Final ACHRE report had looked at this same 

experiment but issued a poorly grounded superficial opinion that the 

radiation exposures did not meet their arbitrary lifetime limit of 1 excess 

cancer death per 1,000 persons so treated, expressed over a lifetime.  The 

final ACHRE report did consider an experiment using NRI on children conducted 

by Johns Hopkins on Baltimore 3rd graders from 1948-53 which did exceed its 

medical notice and followup threshold of 1/1,000 cancer deaths [the only 

human experiment out of 4,000 considered which did exceed this notification 

threshhold] achieving a cancer death value of 8.8/1,000 per ACHRE, or about 1 

cancer death per 100 persons treated,  10 times their limit for medical 

notice. The ACHRE did recommend no notice and no followup of these Baltimore 

experimentally treated schoolchildren in part based on their opinion that 

"most of the risk has probably already been expressed" [if they're going to 

have died, they've died already so why make waves now -- Remarkable ethical 

position from a committee headed by a world-respected bioethicist from Johns 

Hopkins School of Public Health]


Doses to the nasopharynx of NRI treated veterans or children exceeded 2,000 

rad and there is strong evidence in epidemiological studies of excess head 

and neck cancer and brain cancer in children who received NRI in widespread 

use after WWII. 


The DoD and the VA subsequently went along with enabling legislation passed 

in 1998 which included all veterans who received NRI treatments [not just the 

initial Navy experiment under Project X-434] on the VA's Ionizing Radiation 

Registry,  offered a medical screening to any vet who comes forward, and 

opened up full treatment for any NRI treated veteran who developed head and 

neck cancer. Of note there are many adverse outcomes linked to NRI treatments 

of young children [average age 8.8] other than head and neck cancer such as 

an 8.6 fold RR for thyroid disease [ Graves disorder, see Sandler, 1980], and 

an adjusted RR of 30.9 for benign and malignant brain tumors [see Yeh, 1997 

and Yeh, 2001]. 


A very poorly designed study of submariners treated with NRI by a Dr. Haines 

in 1945 under Project X-434 [see Han-Kang, 2000] observed about a 35% higher 

death rate among NRI treated submariners and a suggestive excess [about 28% 

by recollection] of head and neck cancer mortality vs. closely matched 

submariner controls.  This VA Han Kank study is in reality so poorly 

designed, involving the folding into the treated group of about an equal 

number of submariners who never had NRI, that the observations are 

invalidated by the assumptions of how the NRI treated group was defined. This 

study was based on a followup of submariners noted as having had NRI in a 

logbook found in 1996 at New London sub base. About 800 men in the book had 

an R [for radium by their names]. Another 800 or so examined by Haines did 

not have an R. However, in subsequent evaluations done by the VA in 1997-99, 

about 15 men in the non-R group in the Haines logbook had NRI subsequently in 

their Navy service. So the VA made the assumption that all the non-R men in 

the Haines logbook had NRI treatments and included them in the treated 

group!!!!   Absurd assumption, worthless study.


After WWII it is now estimated by the CDC [see Mellinger-Birdsong, 1996] that 

between 571,000 [lo-lo estimate] and 2.6 million [hi-hi estimate] received 

NRI treatments for middle ear problems in the hope of minimizing the effects 

of otitis media due to enlarged adenoids at the opening of the Eustachian 

tubes.


The references noted above can be seen in the Annotated Bibliography on the 

webpage for the Radium Experiments Assessment Project [REAP] found at:


http://www.delphi.com/carsreap

Click here to visit Radium Experiment Assessment Project webpage


Stewart Farber, MS Public Health

Public Health Sciences

Consulting Scientist

172 Old Orchard Way

Warren, VT 05674


(802) 496-3356

email: SAFarberMSPH@cs.com