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Marine Food Products
_ Marine food products from Bikini Atoll supply a substantial portion of
plutonium to the diet for Bikinians.

Some Pu concentrations in fish at Bikini

Atoll have been published by Nevissi and Schell.

14

These data are abstracted

and given in Table 5 along with some data on marine invertebrates. 18
data for fish muscle or eviscerated whole fish and

sing both

the detection limits as

real numbers and weighting by the numbér of fish in a sample, the mean Pu
concentration for fish at Bikini Atoll is 2.2 pCi/kg wet weight.
Concentrations in invertebrate muscle average 1 pCi/kg.

Assuming an

average daily intake of 600 g (or 219 kg/y)y° the total annual plutonium
intake would be 482 pCi.
For comparison, the data listed in Table 3 show a concentration in New

York shellfish and fish of 0.011 pCi/kg and 0.0016 pCi/kg, wet weight, respectively.

The total annual intake of Pu from New York marine products

is 0.024 pCi. _ the ratio of Pu intake through marine food pathway for Bikini

compared to New York is 2x 10°.

Se

DISCUSSION

‘The estimated annual intake
in Table 6.

|

of Pu through various pathways is given

With the possible exception of the inhalation pathway, available

‘data indicate that all exposure pathways will contribute a higher Pu body burden
to Bikinians than to New York residents.

Since surface soil concentrations at

Bikini are much higher than New York and the resuspended material created by a

person in his immediate environment as a result of daily activities may be
a more important factor for estimating the intake by resuspension inhalation ~
than open air Pu concentrations, we beTieve that the Pu intake via inhalation
&7

7 ome

at Bikini Atoll] would exceed that in New York.

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