the size of the program and to the number of people potentially benefitted. The proposed bill would ease the implementation of the program and sub- stantially reduce its cost by limiting the program to the people and atolls specifically identified in it. Section 1 of the bill meets the foregoing problems by stating precisely who the beneficiaries of the legislation would be at this time: (a) the residents of Enewetak, Rongelap, and Utirik who are actually living on the atolls; (b) the residents of Kili (where about 600 of the 900 Bikinians now live) who are actually living on the island; (c) the residents of Ujelang (where about 90 of the 600 Enewetak people now live, with almost all of the remaining Enewetakese living on Enewetak Atoll) who are acually living on the atoll; and (c) the 174 residents of Rongelap and Utirik on March ], 1954, regardless of where they now live, so long as it is within the Marshall Islands. Those in the first three categories would receive medical care and treatment through fiscal year 2002; those in the last category, people who were on Rongelap and Utirik on March 1, 1954, would receive medical care and treatment for life. Lawyers for the interested Marshallese groups have contended that section 102 as it now stands should be construed to apply to the "peoples" of the atolls, regardless of where in the Marshalls they now reside, given the meaning customarily accorded to that term in Marshallese and Pacific Islands usage. If that were done, a further problem of large dimensions arises: many of the "peoples" of Bikini, Rongelap, and Utirik, and to a limited extent of Enewetak, currently which has they live have migrated to other atolls and islands of the Marshalls. They live on at least 50% of the atulls and islands of the Marshalis -26 atolls and hundreds of islands. On most such islands or atolls among people who were not substantially affected by the testing program. There are ethical and practical problems that arise in any program that provides one kind of medical care for one individual of one group (e.g., the nuclearaffected people), while providing a different level of medical care to all others of the community. For that reason, Interior’s contractor devised an alternative plan that would provide medical care for the peoples of the four named atolls, wherever they now reside in the Marshalls. That plan also calls for providing the same medical care for other residents on those atolls or islands. That program was estimated to cost almost as much as the program for all of the Marshalls, i.e., $10.6 million for the first year (compared to $10.9 million), and $75.6 million for the first five years (compared to $77 million). The proposed bill avoids the foregoing results. It generally applies not to "peoples" but to current residents of particular atolls and islands, thereby permitting the program to be confined to a limited number of named islands. The exception is the people who lived on Rongelap and Utirik on March 1, 1954, who, in our view, should be permitted to benefit from the program regardless of where they now reside, so long as it is in the Marshalls. It is these two groups, i.e., Rongelap and Utirik residents on that 1954 date, who have