RE: Fwd: Student Accused in Poisoning Case

[Robert_A_Jones@RL.gov]

Before anyone gets upset at the writer of the article (I have not had a
chance to read it yet), I think we should think of the forest through
the trees.  There should be some difference in our professional response
to slight technical inaccuracies and blatant truth bending.  Both should
be handled rationally - a response such as "you idiots" is clearly not
appropriate for technical inaccuracies.  

I doubt that most people have a clear concept of half-life, and I also
doubt that professionals get technical information from news articles.
Technical inaccuracies can be handled by talking calmly to the reporter
- you may even see a correction printed.  Blatant truth-bending can be
handled through a chain of command (talk to writer, editor, management
and so-on).

Robert A. Jones			Robert_A_Jones@rl.gov
Health Physicist 			phone: (509)376-8528
PFP Radiological Control 		fax: (509)373-4274
Hanford, WA				Hanford Pager: 85-6559 


	-----Original Message-----
	From:	bobscottchp@juno.com [SMTP:bobscottchp@juno.com]
	Sent:	Monday, November 16, 1998 11:41 AM
	To:	Multiple recipients of list
	Subject:	Re: Fwd: Student Accused in Poisoning Case

		Before everyone goes jumping up and down over some minor
	misprints in the Providence-Journal, I want to tell you that the
article
	in the Sunday Providence-Journal was fairly low key and clear.
Of
	course, Ninni Jacob will know all the facts (talk about baptism
by fire,
	Ninni has it tough), but I was surprised at how fair the article
seemed
	to be.  

		Of course we know that I-125 is not used for diagnosis
or therapy
	of thyroid problems, and we know that the half-life of I-125 is
about 60
	days, but apart from that, I felt the writer kept her (I think
it was a
	woman reporter) head.  

	from Bob Scott
	Roger Williams Medical Center
	Providence, RI
	bobscottchp@juno.com

	On Mon, 16 Nov 1998 10:26:41 -0600 (CST) Mr Jo <mjo@scs.unr.edu>
writes:
	>The article states that I-125 has a half life of 6 months. I
wonder 
	>how  the
	>Associated Press obtained this info.


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