— Ate ee this group (3 among 21 thyroid lesions in 67 Rongelap people exposed) makes the etiological role of radiation exposure increasingly probably. For the time being the single maligni..t lesion . found in the thyroid of the woman from Utirik atoll cannot: be attributed to radiation exposure because of the low dose of radiation received by the people from that atoll. The significance of radiation exposure of the thyroid glands in the Rongelap people had not been fully appreciated until the actual appearance > of thyroid lesions. More careful review of the dose calculations indicated that considerable exposures from radioactive iodine absorption had probably occurred particularly in the children, | : The exposure of the Ronge lap people . was not comparable to exposure of populations from fallout from reactor Po accidents where radionuclides are chiefly absorbed from contaminated milk obtained from cattle grazing on contaminated pastures. In the Marshall - islands there are no cattle and no local milk supply, (Mothers milk may | _ have contributed to the radioiodine absorption in 2 children who were reported to have been nursing at the tine of the accident). But there was heavy contamination of food and water supplies on Rongelap and a relative abundance of radioiodines in the falloutz The dose to the "thyroid glands was greater by a factor of 2 in adults and a factor of about 7 in children over that to other organs of the body. Numerous animal studies have’ demonstrated the role of radiation in . the etiology of thyroid neoplasms®-8, In the human being the development of thyroid nodules and cancer from X-irradiation?~10, particularly when the radiation of the gland occurs in infancy and childhood!1-13 is well documented, Development of such lesions from radioiodines has also been . ! DOE ARCHIVES $e PF a”