Re: Rad. induced heart attacks

[JMUCKERHEIDE@delphi.com]

>But I 
>am astounded that any rational intelligent members of the University 
>community would make such allegations; what do they teach their
>students??!!!

>Good luck.

>Ron Kathren

Yes. Even in the "university community"! 

It seems from (when I was) reading a number of "science", "environment",
"energy", and "biology" usenet groups, the "university community" is the
SOURCE of much such (mis-)perception. A LOT of this seems related to the
missions of government to respond to "politically correct" opportunism that
then sponsors university work that meets the political dogma. (They can get
somebody to do the work and generate the "right" answers with enough
funding, then they are the stars and become the tenured faculty, and know
how the system works. Often they can point out that they were very careful
in what they said, that the government policy makers and Congressmen and
media, and political advocates "misused" their work.) 

This of course applies to the radiation phobia prevalent in the "university
community" as well as the public, politicians and media, but as Rosalyn
Yalow points out every time she has a chance to talk to the radiation
science community she makes it clear that the message is what the
unsophisticated get from the precise language of the radiation scientist and
policy makers: any amount of radiation is DANGEROUS (at least enough to
justify spending a great deal more money on research and rad protection) and
for the government bureaucracies to justify more power, budget, staff,
funding, and authority to "protect" the public. 

We all contribute directly to that when we overstate concerns, overreact to
inconsequential sources and exposures, support the need for greater rad
controls, and lower decon and restoration requirements (or don't respond in
outrage to the idea of a 3 mr/yr cleanup standard proposed by NRC!? - if its
3 mr/yr by analysis, its probably 0.3 mr/yr or less in reality - and many
$Millions/Billions in public investment in HEALTH AND SAFETY!??) 

What ever happened to initiative to respond to issues in terms of
$/person-rem reduction - if $1000 is a guide in NRC rules for power plant
waste management systems, what are current regulatory initiatives and rad
controls practices costing, in labs, in medicine, in power? Has anyone done
such analyses? even for "internal" management consumption if not for policy
response or public consumption? (Would you do a paper on it in June in
Philadelphia?)

Regards, Jim Muckerheide