Letter to Seaborg, Subject: Report on the 97TH Meeting of the Advisory Committee for Biology and Medicine, Held at the Health and Safety Laboratory, New York, March 8-9, 1963

Page 1

The 97th meeting of the Advisory Committee f o r Biology and Medicine was held a t the Health and Safety Laboratory, New York Operations ' Office, NeW York city, on Warch 8 and 9 , 1963. A l l member6 except the replacement of the members of the Cormittee vho are retiring this year, and def in ft e recarnabendations of Dr. Philip P. Cohen, of the Dr. Earl L. Green, of the Jackeon Memorial Laboratory, t o replace the preeent chairman, have been forwarded t o you. The program of the 97th meeting consisted principally of a review of the activities of the Health and Safety Laboratory. These activities fall largely in the area of research, but the Laboratory also bear8 a considerable responsibility of an administrative character, i n assistance to the New Pork Operations Office i n matters of licensing, industrial health and safety. increasing demands i n the latter respect which, according to Dr. Harley, require about 20% of his scientific manpower, and may encroach signi - fi cant ly on the important research activities of the Health and Safety Laboratory, which are an integral part of the research program of the Division of Biology and Medicine. continuing attention to this relationship for the beet inter eet s of all parties concerned. Further consideration was given to I am pleased to learn W e are quite concerned about the We also considered the relationships of the work done by HASL to that o f other agencies, in particular the Public Health Service, which h8s primary responsibility for the collection and distribution of infor - mation relating to fallout and other exposures t o atomic radiation. HASL i s concerned mainly with engineering and reaearch, nevertheless, there is inevitably some overlapping with the Public Health Service i n the monitoring of fallout. working-level reviews and contacts betweentthe two agencies, and t h e i r roles may be described as supplementing each other effectively rather than duplicating effort or creating confusion. Certainly, HASL it3 producing data and conducting studies which are most valuable. research program i s sound, and the data presented t o us respecting the There seem t o be good top-level and

Page 2

levels of Ra226 in the humen d i e t and i n -bone in the three cities, New Pork, Chicago, and San Francisco are mo6t valu8ble. good corxalatloa of bone to dietary amply ref l eating the preciclion of the memuremcntc). levels in the three cities, The principal objective of the rerearch program at HASL is the evaluation of the quality and quantity of ewiromnental contaminants resulting from weapons tests, but also fran atomic energy operations ties for making ouch measurements (filter a, samplers and recording devices) and their testing and application in field studies. presentation of the program on inetrumentxtion a t W L , the fmgortancs becarrte evident t o us of the need for u fuller flow of information that considerable thought should be devoted t o the mean8 of bringing ~ this about. Scheduled but informal meetings of workere on instrumentation, or publication of instrumentation new and an instrument catalog i n some form, are two obvioue ways of epeeding the flow of information; but perhape more novel means may be more effective at a time when the development of instrumentation is proceeding so rapidly that each isolated group is ll k ely to be far ahead of the other8 i n some respects and far behind In other respects. The program lmrolves the development of suitable raodalimrt her attention wae, directed upon the problems of the safety of radioactive devices (eealing of 80urces, shipping containers, etc.). This problem may w e l l become critical ae individual states proceed now t o formulate their own licensing regulations. The ACBM believe8 that some government agency (perhape the Bureau of Standards) should be asked t o develop a cw abi lft y for the routine eafetp test lng of auch devices, and t o provide advice on such matters t o industry and t o state regulatory agencies when requested. urgency, for chaos will develop rapidly if fifty separate states proceed t o act i n these matters quite independently and quite differ - This matter is of considerable We are continuing our Consideration of the desirability of re firing replicas of the Hiroshima and Nagaeaki weapons I n order to obtain more precise data on the delivered doses to the survivora. The issues a r e complex, and we do not wish t o render advice on so weighty a matter too viewe on the subject. We hope that we can soon transmit our fully considered