The Health Physicist
A word needs to be said about health physics, a relatively new
academic specialty which has emerged since the dropping of the
atomic bomb. Systematic study of radiation health questions began at
the University of Chicago when the first nuclear reactor began
operating on 2 December 1942. Primarily under the leadership of
physicists E. O. Wollan, H. M. Parker, C. C. Gamertsfelder,
K. Z. Morgan, J. C. Hart, R. R. Coveyou, O. G. Landsverk and L. A. Pardue,
it grew to become a recognised graduate-level
discipline.[40]
While
this was a much-needed specialty, its bias toward the
so-called `hard sciences' -- physics, chemistry and engineering -- and
neglect of the `soft sciences' -- biology, physiology and psychology --
has tended to create radiation safety officers rather than health
professionals.
In
a message from the President of the Health Physics Society
published in the July 1971 issue of the Health Physics
Journal,[41]
Dade W. Moeller stated:
I think it is interesting to note the results of a tabulation of the
records of the 2,862 health physicists who joined the Society from
1960 through 1969. The data showed that although half of the new
members with college degrees had attended graduate school for a
year or more, 21.6 per cent of the new members did not have a
college degree. [Emphasis added.]
Membership of the Health Physics Society is broader than, but
includes, licensed health physicists who have passed qualifying
examinations. These latter are generally required to have a college
degree with a major in physics, chemistry or engineering, and one
year of graduate training in radiation measurement and safety
practices.
Dade
W. Moeller goes on to describe the members who had a
college degree:
by far the greatest percentage (24.0 per cent) received their
bachelor's degrees in physics and/or mathematics. Next was
chemistry (15.8 per cent) and then engineering (13.6 per cent).
Even members of the Health Physics Society have complained about
the pro-nuclear bias of its
publication[42]
but seldom has this been
expressed as clearly as in this address by Dade Moeller. After
reporting a need for 2,000 to 3,000 more health physicists by the year
2000 just to support the operation of nuclear power stations, he urged
members to be active: `To paraphrase an old adage, "let's all put our
mouth where our money is".'
Unfortunately,
the Health Physics Society probably will not be in
the vanguard speaking on behalf of workers and members of the
public whose health is at risk from nuclear industries. The obvious and
outstanding exception to this statement is Dr Karl Z. Morgan who has
remained an open, honest and independent student of life. Dr Morgan
has spoken out courageously on behalf of lowering worker and public
exposures to radiation and avoiding all unnecessary exposures. In so
doing he has alienated many of his peers and jeopardised his own
research and teaching position. Karl Morgan was a friend of Hermann
Müller and he remembers the geneticist's warning about undermining
the health of a nation and its
children.[43]
The
United States, a leading nuclear nation, has failed to provide
any reliable human health study either to confirm or to deny its
prediction of the human health effects of exposure to chronic low
level radiation, or even to provide a systematic health follow-up of
the significant groups exposed to radiation so that there will in time
be such a reliable study. The predictions of health effects are based
primarily on the effects reported at Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the
applicability of these estimates to chronic low dose exposure of a
normal population has always been
doubtful.[21]
The
US government has also failed to supply the worker or the
public with trained health professionals whose jobs are independent of
the nuclear industry and whose training and background would enable
them to alert people to a slowly deteriorating health situation. Adequate
record-keeping and reporting would force public awareness
of the problems, and probably the facing of ultimate questions such
as: for what perceived benefit can society sacrifice the health of
future generations?
The
health physicist, while serving a necessary safety function
within nuclear installations, does not fulfil the role of a health
advocate in this situation. His or her job is to enforce regulations, not
to question them and to support the nuclear plant management even if
it is clear that the management is
wrong.[44]
This is not so much the result of
malice as a normal outcome of believing `permissible' is the same as
`safe', and trust that present regulations are `very safe'. It thus
becomes acceptable to handle radioactive material and to cheat a
little on over-exposures.
The
first key to understanding governments' commitment to
ensuring the survival of individual citizens is its adoption of a
verification process for testing its prediction of severe health effects
resulting from its economic and military strategies. In the United
States, this leads to a preliminary judgment that individuals have
been considered expendable. Health damage from radiation
associated with military or economic ventures has not been easily
traceable to the cause or immediately apparent to the public. No
efforts deliberately to trace and make public all the health effects
have been made. In fact, when any research has begun to show such
effects, the researcher has been `discredited' and his or her funding
discontinued.
On
the basis of the US government's neglect of follow-up and
record keeping on radiation-exposed people, and its lack of concern
for mild genetic effects, the unrest of the US public with respect to
further development of nuclear technology is highly rational. Continuance
of present government neglect and unconcern is at best
irrational and at worst genocidal. We may observe the same syndrome
of irrational behaviour in other nuclear nations which are experiencing
public unrest.
Although
the problems inherent in the production of nuclear
weapons and nuclear power reach a climax of scale in the United States,
they are experienced in all countries with nuclear technology. Where
one country may keep excellent public health records, it has
poor records of individual radiation exposures. Where another keeps
detailed radiation exposure histories, it has no detailed medical
history. As long as part of the information is missing, the worker and
general public are forced to rely on predictions made by `recognised
experts' which are not verified by factual studies. This is really a
forecast with no audit allowed. The promotion of nuclear technology
in developing nations as the industry loses support in the developed
world is even more disturbing.
Before
moving on, some of the concepts of radiation protection
important for nuclear workers, the general public and medical
personnel need to be emphasised. First, an assurance of `no immediate
danger' with respect to exposure to ionising radiation is empty when it
masks long-term effects resulting from incorporation of radiochemicals
in sensitive tissues and/or the results of biological magnification of
cell damage or radiation-induced genetic mistakes. Secondly,
independent testing of urine, faeces, exhalation, tissues removed in
surgery, baby teeth and hair for radioactivity, must become routine
laboratory tests for medical diagnostic purposes as we try to cope with
the fission product pollution already in the biosphere. Thirdly, when
assessing the impact of any leak, abnormal release, normal effluence
or waste which is radioactive, it is essential to know the
radiochemicals involved: their physical and biological properties, the
potential pathways to human beings and the length of time they
remain toxic. Fourthly, the health effects of radiation differ with the
age of the person exposed, his or her physical status and prior
experience.
The
second key to governmental priorities in decision-making is
found in the historical context of the nuclear development. This is
examined later. First we must try to understand the practices of
nuclear technology in the military and civil sectors.
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