PRIVACY AGT MATERI AL REMOVED State Insusance Fund requested the opinion of the medical director of the US. Public Health Service as to whether or not the malignancy was due to radiation exposure. In reply the following report was received: which the uranium mining to the time employment in underground this case that feel d wout | then , years at least 15 tumor was developed, is feel that cause of cancer was is compensable, for 1 would certainty probably radiation. This is-a cell type which has not been definitely associated with either uranium mining of cigarette smoking. We are in the process of writing a new paper on the cell type of lung cancer among uranium miners. This new analysis again emphasizes the preponderance of small cell undifferentiated. There are appreciable percentages of other cell types which occur among the miners- even among the most heavily exposed. Our present thinking is that radiation may cause any of the cell types, but that they are much mote likely to produce the small cell 1 the various alreports from lp of the medical ceipt : | Following rece ngs: ings indi Colorado Find ded tu admit deci d ensation Insurance Fun physicians involved, the State Comp benefits due h deat for lity liabi © { n ssio admissi d, accordingly, a formal admi iabl order of the by oved sston of liability was appr thewidow wasfiled. Pus admi Division of Labor. undifferentiated types than the others. Accordingly, { would not presently regard the cell type in this case as a negative factor in deciding causation. Rather, { would regard it as neutral with respect to both radiation and cigarette smoking, and make the determination on other factors. = ty te in view of the relatively high radiation exposure (attested to by our WLM estimate and by bone lead-210), the appropriate interval between start of mining and lung cancer, and his relatively young age, it is my opinion that 4 lung cancer was probably caused by his occupational radiation exposure. An inquiry concerningcell type was also made of the physician who did the autopsy and he replied as follows: I would classify the “Bronchilor (alveolar cell) carcinoma” as type IHf, sub-type A, sub-type fF, (U1, A,!). { have never seen this type of carcinoma before in a uranium miner exposed to radon gas but my experience in lung cancers in uranium miners has been Hmited to two or three cases. | would doubt that this type of tumor is often seen in uranium miners but then it is not a common tumor of the lung and accounts for only 3-4% ofall malignant tumors of the lung. Perhaps because of this rarity, it is rarely seen in uranium miners, While | could aot inake a positive causal relation between this type of malignancy and his exposure to radon gas in uranium mining, | certainly could not exclude this possibility. A further opinion was requested from a pathologist who had done a great deal of research on the relationship between lung cancer and exposure to radon daughters in uranium mining. In his reply he stated: ...1 have maintained that all people can develop an oat cell carcinoma of the lung whether the individual is a miner or not, and actually the degree of exposure should be the determining factor in whether or not the case is compensable. From the.data you presented on the lead and poloniumlevels, it is quite obvious with the support of estimates of WLM of 2,850 that this case has sustained a tremendous amount of radiation, If the latent period, that is the time from the beginning of 174 175 MOVED PRIVACY ACT MATERIAL RE