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FACT SHEET ON MANHATTAN ENCINEER DISTKICT Purpose of Study: To determino excretion rata for pllrtnniirrn in man. Weed : 11 Several thousand MEJl workcrs 2) Accurate information needed on retention and excretion o f intcrnal plutonium for sctting safety crito ria. 3) Animal experiments produced conflicting data which could.nntbe extrapolated to man. Protocdl,: Selected hospitalizcd patients injected with various amounts of so lub lc plutonium. co llcc ted, measwed and recorded for plutonium dis - charge for several weeks Eiftcr injection. Between A p r i l , 1945 and July, 1 9 4 7 CAEC established in January, 1947. One patient injected after that, MED Hospital in Oak Ridge, Tennesscc. (1) Strong Memorial Hospital of the University of Rochester, Rochester, New York. (11) Billings Hospital o f the University of Chicago, University Hospital of tho University of California, The three university hospitals were associated with #ED contractor laboratories and some staff members held joint appointments at the hospital and the MED
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By combination of age and health prognosis - prefer rih ly 45. or older and/or with a life cx pcc tnn cy from a n existing disease of less than 10 years.Most patients in vol vcd were diiignoserf a s having somc disease which would h crat a1 w f thin a shorter period.nev ration from these criteria occurred. f n one casc, the diagnosis later proved to L c Smvival Time after Injections :--- < t 6 ... to diagnosed existing illness. Latcr deaths unrel;it.ed t o plutonium exposure no evidence to suggest that the plutonium By cvr r cnt standards for a body burden Range from 2 to 145 (I. case) .injection influenced the course of the Scientific References to Study’: Passing references to this study have been made in the scientific literature from time tr~ time. Several rcports on the study,wcre written between 1946 and 1950 by De ople as s dci a ted with the .... tudy. Many remained classified until about 1969-1971.
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Several unclassified reports were published over the years. plutonium: in Industrial Medicine on the Pluto ~ ~ irtr nP ro j ect TV, Vol, 20, Mc Craw - Hill, New York, 246-263 (1951). exposures i n man: Health Phys. 10:.773-389 (1964). The definitive dis'cussion af t h e study was in a cliaptur by Dr, Patricia Durbin entitled " Plutonium in Pian: A Xew Look i n the book Radiobiology In 1972 Dr. Patricia Durbin, who had acctlmulated data on study for book chapter, explored possibility of rollowing up living In 1973 Dr. Durbih transferred infornation and records t o Dr. Rrrwland and the Center for Human Radio biology (CIIR) a t Argonne NaTianal Laboratory. CJIR arranged for follow up study Of three of the four living px ti ents arid for exhumation of thc y of two deceased patients. n'-Z974 two papers on follow up were prcpared for International Congress of Radiation Research meting in Seattle.
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WOTE TU EDITORS AND COKYE9PONDENTS: The attached Fact Sheet on the Injection of 18 patients with plutonium undcr the Worl~! War I T Manhattan Projects (MEn) wzs prepared hy t h e Atomic Energy Commirjsion in 1 9 7 4 . (The I3RDA inherited the AEC records on this Matter when it ‘came into being in 1975). In 1 9 7 4 , also, t h e AEC conducted an investigation t o determine whether or not the patients had been told the nature o f the injections and had given their permission, It was fQUild that the patient injected in 1947 had been informed and had signed a consent agrccinent in the presence o f two doctors. The records on the othcr 1 7 patients1 As a result of the 1 9 7 4 investigation, the dactors of the four patients alive at that time were contacted and asked to tell the patients of the nature of the MED injections. One was not told because her doctor felt the knowledge would babe detrimental to her health. She has since died. The ather thrcc patients, all of whom are alive as of February, 1976, were in form cd an deigned consent forms) providing for periodic medical follow up studies. b y Urs. Dkrbin and Rowland on the findings t h u s far crf the follow up studies. Since 1974,also,scientific papers have been presented