COVINGTON & BURLING Mr. Wallace O. Green Page Four December 17, 1980 incomplete medical records, brief interviews with a limited number of Marshallese citizens and a cuick reading, without independent analysis, of reports prepared by the Brookhaven We do not fault Loma Linda for not National Laboratory. undertaking the extensive medical, epidemiological and other scientific testing necessary to analyze the health effects However, of radiation exposure on the Marshallese people. absent such independent testing and analysis, we cannot accept a conclusion by Loma Linda disclaiming the existence of radiation related health effects. At the present time, the data necessary to determine the extent of radiation related health effects throughout the Marshall Islands simply is not available. The Government of the Marshall Islands has repeatedly requested since May of 1979 that medical analysis, including blood chemistries, be conducted to detect potentially radiation related diseases throughout the Marshall Islands, and par- ticularly in the northern atolls, other than Bikini, Enewetak, Rongelap and Utirik. Unlike Bikini, Enewetak, Rongelap and Utirik, these other atolls virtually have been ignored by previous United States investigations. Although we have engaged in extensive discussions with the Department of Energy and the Department of Interior regarding the initia- tion of such a program, and were told that the United States was prepared to begin medical and other blood chemistry analysis in these previously ignored northern atolls, no such testing has been conducted. Similarly, the United States repeatedly has promised to provide to the Government of the Marshall Islands access to the data accumulated by . the United States in the conduct of its Northern Marshall Islands Radiation Survey. However, each time the Government of the Marshall Islands seeks to enforce that promise, as they did at the interagency meetings at the Interior Department in May of 1979, in August of 1980 and again on December 10, 1980, the United States has responded that the data was not yet available, but would be forthcoming within the next few months. The Government of the Marshall Islands must have access to this data, in raw form, in order to conduct the independent analysis which is critical to the effective and statutorily mandated participation of the Government of the Marshall Islands in the implementation of P.L. 96-205 and in the conclusion of the political status negotiations.