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The sequence of safety recommendations and guides has run as{follows.
(a)
In 1954 the National Bureau of Standards Handbook 59Ipresented
the recommendations of the NCRP.
The maximum permissible dosejto the
bone marrow (and hence to the entire body) was 0.3 rem per weef.
(b) In January, 1957, the whole-body dose for the genera!
population was lowered to .5 rem per year by the NCRP. This w
published as an insert into Handbook 59. The AEC also publish
other recommendations in Appendix 10, p. 400 of its 22nd Semia
Report to the Congress.
{c) In 1960, the Federal Radiation Council defined two
the general population. The "radiation protection guide" for
case of protection was .170 rem per year. The “protective act
to cover spills and other accidents, was .2 rem per year to th
marrow.
These regulations, now administered by EPA, are still
(d) In the period 1985-87, the ICRP (1985) and the NCRP (
dropped their recommendations for the general population to .1
year.
When the Rongelap people returned in 1957, therefore, the
employed by the AEC was 0.5 rem per year.
It is not clear to
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this guide was met, although it may have been approximately, i
a factor of two. The external dose was stated to be less than
R/year, and strontium-90 was considered to be the only signifi
radionuclide determining the internal dose (Dunning 1957). Le
(Note 7), by extrapolation, found the committed effective dose
to be about 0.7 rem in 1957, .44 rem in 1958, and .36 rem in 1
estimates do not allow for the contributions of plutonium and
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