Re: Fwd: BEIR VII public meeting

[Jim Muckerheide <jmuckerheide@delphi.com>]

More important than attending the meeting is stopping the meeting.

The Committee is now more biased than before the revisions, including esp.
throwing Ken Mossman off, and adding Herb Abrams, a Board member of the
anti-nuclear political activist organization Physicians for Social
Responsibility. (They don't report that in the extensive bio for him on the
NAS site).

You have until Aug. 30 to comment on the makeup of the Committee.

(A copy of our comments on the original Committee appear at the end.)

Thanks.

Regards, Jim Muckerheide
muckerheide@mediaone.net
====================

"Michael C. Baker" wrote:

> --  Forwarded --
>
> The first BEIR VII information-gathering committee meeting, which will be
> open to the public and will allow for public input, has been posted on the
> Academies' web site (http://www.national-academies.org select Current
> Projects). It may be easier for you to use the following URL which should
> take you directly to the meeting information.
>
> http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/MeetingDisplay2/BRER-K-98-02-A?OpenDocument
>
> Committee on the Health Risks from Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing
> Radiation (BEIR VII - Phase 2)
> September 2, 1999 - September 3, 1999
> Room 250, National Academy of Sciences Building
> 2100 C St. NW, Washington, DC
>
> If you would like to attend the sessions of this meeting that are open to
> the public, would like to make a comment during the public comment period,
> or need more information please contact:
>     Contact Name: Rick Jostes
>     Email: rjoste-@nas.edu
>     Phone: [202] 334-2840
>     Fax: [202] 334-1639
>
> Agenda:
>     Thursday, September 2, 1999
>     2:00 - 5:00 PM Room 250 NAS
>
>     2:00 - 2:30 PM
>    Introduction of Committee Members
>
>     2:30 - 3:00 PM
>     Invited Speaker
>
>     John Boice, Ph.D.
>     International Epidemiology Institute
>     Epidemiology that should be considered by BEIR VII
>
>     3:00 - 4:00 PM
>     Presentations by Sponsors
>
>     Jerome Puskin, Ph.D.
>     Environmental Protection Agency
>
>     Vincent Holahan, Ph.D.
>     US Nuclear Regulatory Commission
>
>     Bonnie Richter, Ph.D
>     US Department of Energy
>
>     4:00 - 4:15 PM Break
>
>     4:15 PM - 5:00 PM
>     Committee business and opportunity for public comment.
>
>     Friday, September 3, 1999
>     10:00 - 12:00 AM Room 250 NAS
>
>     Invited speaker
>     10:00 - 10:30 AM
>     Charles Waldren, Ph.D.
>     Colorado State University
>     Adaptive effects, genomic instability, and bystander effects.
>
>     10:30 - 12:00 AM
>     Committee business and opportunity for public comment.
> ___________________________________________________________
>
> [The following URL can be used to view changes to the BEIR VII provisional
> committee:
>
> http://www4.nas.edu/webcr.nsf/CommitteeDisplay/BRER-K-98-02-A?OpenDocument
>
> The public comment period lasts twenty days from the date of Committee
> Membership

June 21, 1999

Project Number: BRER-K-98-02-A

Subject: Revise Proposed BEIR VII Committee

Dear Dr. Douple, Dr. Jostes,

Per our discussions, from the perspective of Radiation, Science, and
Health, and the radiation biology sciences and scientists, we request
that you revise the BEIR VII Committee to include persons that have
substantively questioned the LNT, and to limit participation by persons
from the established ICRP/NCRP/BRER-BEIR organization.

First, to be the "impartial review" necessary to respond to the bias of
the commitment to the LNT, it is especially important to limit
ICRP/NCRP/BRER-affiliated persons and others who are committed to the
LNT and associated government agency funding, such as Drs. Cox and
Sankaranarayanan, and some of whom have been explicitly identified as
obfuscating data so as to support the LNT, such as Dr. Howe and persons
associated with the IARC study. We can document our specific concerns by
individual if you have doubts about the relevant persons.

Also, there is no need, and it is particularly inappropriate, to include
persons who are "expert" in "risk communication". This role, and the
performance of such individuals, PRESUMES that there is a risk at low
doses. For example, Dr. Whipple has interests and has advocated for
costly waste management and sequestering of radioactive wastes that
wholly depends on promulgating fear of low doses that requires the LNT
to be achieved. Such participants also misdirect attention from the
essential resolution of the scientific bases for the biological effects
of low dose radiation.

More importantly, participation by high-level expert scientists that
have substantially questioned the LNT in the peer-reviewed scientific
literature must participate to even begin to conduct an impartial
review. This does not include "extremists" such as you have included in
the current makeup of the committee on behalf of the LNT,

There are many highly qualified candidates. For example, in the U.S.:
Drs. Ludwig Feinendegen, Victor Bond, Paul Selby, Philip Hanawalt,
Harald Rossi, Lois Gold, Joan Smith-Sonneborn, James Trosko, John 'Jake'
Spalding, Robert G. Thomas, Robert Rowland, Alan Brodsky, Takeo
Makinodan, S. Jill James, Douglas Crawford-Brown; from Japan: Drs. Sohei
Kondo, Kiyohiko Sakamoto, Tsutomu Sugahara; from Europe: Maurice
Tubiana, Pierre Pellerin, Roland Masse, Zbigniew Jaworowski, Gunnar
Walinder; from China: Shu-Zheng Liu, Luxin Wei; from India: P. Kesavan;
from Russia: Alexander Kuzin, Z. Tokarskaya; and many others.

If you would like us to provide a list contributed to and considered by
our Board and others from the knowledgeable scientific community, even
as to whether they would consider serving, we will respond.

Without such a commitment, the BEIR VII Committee and Report can only
reasonably be considered "more of the same" that continues to fail to
consider the substantive scientific data in accordance with scientific
principles, rather than continuing to simply accommodate bureaucratic
principles to fund the maintenance of the costly radiation protection
policies that can produce no public health benefits. This failure, the
documentation of the bias and invalid scientific results, and the call
for an impartial review through other mechanisms than NRC/BRER, must
therefore continue.

Finally, we appreciate that you will be asked by anti-nuclear political
interests to include other "scientists" that criticize the
ICRP/NCRP/BRER-BEIR conclusions. You should request any such interests
to propose any credible scientists be included, and you should include
any such persons that can be considered as credible scientists that have
published substantial results in the scientific literature on the
committee (and perhaps a need to document the lack of credibility of
some if necessary). Such potential participation is imperative to
establish that this is an "open" and impartial review, as long as the
opportunities to document sound scientific determinations are not
precluded.

Since the Federal courts have often found that no scientific evidence
exists that can be reasonably considered to indicate an adverse effect
by radiation below 10 cSv, we are confident that an equally rigorous
scientific review can do no less. (This was demonstrated even by the
August 1997 "Wingspread Conference" which the LNT-committed agencies and
review bodies have failed to implement, while producing the highly
biased BEIR VI and NCRP SC 1-6 reports.)

We hope that you will consider these comments as positive and critical
to the ability to achieve, and be perceived as achieving, an open and
impartial review on behalf of the greater public welfare.

As you know, we have been traveling extensively the last two weeks. I
apologize in advance for the lack of time and review/editing that have
gone into these comments. We will be glad to clarify any aspect of this
letter.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment.

Sincerely,

Jim Muckerheide
Radiation, Science, and Health

cc: Bruce Alberts, President, NAS/NRC
Senator Pete Domenici
Senator Frank Murkowski
Senator John Chafee
Senator Jim Inhofe
Representative Tom Bliley
Representative Joe Barton
Greta Joy Dicus, Chairman-designate, USNRC
Carol Browner, Administrator, USEPA
Bill Richardson, Secretary, USDOE




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