Re: Niagara, Franz, Kidneys around MED AEC sites

["jjcohen" <jjcohen@PRODIGY.NET>]

        Ruth,

            The Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program

      (EEOICP) was established pursuant to Congressional legislation to

  provide

      financial assistance to workers  (DOE employees and contractors)

largely

      associated with nuclear weaponsdevelopment. It was, IMHO, simply a

       "feel good" move by Congress to compensate those who may have

suffered

       illness because of  work involving possible exposure to radiation and

    other hazards (like beryllium). I don't know why Congress designated

      "energy employees" for this benefit. Maybe

      they figured that such illness was punishment for working in an evil

      industry. Although perhaps well-intended, the EEOICP amounts to little

    more than a fraud on the taxpayer since determining those entitled to

      compensation is akin to finding a needle in a haystack while

  blindfolded.

            Suppose, for example, a facility had 10,000 workers, all of who

    worked for 30 years and received a radiation dose of 100 mrem/a.(Not

very

  likely,

      but a conservative assumption). This exposure would amount to ~ 30,000

      person-rem. Using the BEIR estimate of ~0.0005 cancers/person-rem

would

      indicate 15 excess cancers cases among this group. How these cases

could

    be discerned within a general overall expectation of 2000 +/- 100 cancer

    deaths  in a population of 10,000 is beyond me. Maybe you can figure it

  out. It

      might be easier and cheaper for them to simply  compensate  all

former

      energy employees. In case you were wondering, that would include you

and

    me.

        Best regards,   Jerry







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

        From: <RuthWeiner@AOL.COM>

        To: "Rick Orthen" <rorthen@cecinc.com>; <NiagaraNet@AOL.COM>;

      <franz.schoenhofer@CHELLO.AT>; <radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu>

        Sent: Thursday, April 01, 2004 12:27 PM

        Subject: RE: Niagara, Franz, Kidneys around MED AEC sites





        > Thank you Rick.  I foundthe testimony very informative.  The

  following

      phrase in particular caught my attention:

        >

        > "DOL uses the results of this dose reconstruction and the HHS

    guidelines

      for probability of causation to determine whether the cancer of the

    employee

      was at least as likely as not to have been related to his or her

  exposure

    to

      radiation in the performance of duty. "

        >

        > If the exposure to radiation IN THE PERFORMANCE OF DUTY took place

    more

      than 50 years ago, I cannot understand how a cancer could be related

to

    that

      exposure and not to the myriad carcinogenic exposures the individual

  must

      have had during the intervening half-century.  Perhaps someone (other

  than

      Mr. Ricciutti!) can explain this to me.

        >

        > Ruth

        >

        >

        > --

        > Ruth F. Weiner

        > ruthweiner@aol.com

        > 505-856-5011

        > (o)505-284-8406

        >

        >

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