401917 ‘ & Continued from First Page were told the dose of radiation they received was too low to cause harmful effects. “Thyroid nodules have been {ncreasing in the Utirik people andthis LOS ANGELES, CALIF. TIMES was quite unpredicted and we had Mo- 1,000,866 S geome of the best experts in the United BEST COPY AVAILABLE ~ whi, 227, 377 tee 44 gap States,” said Dr. Robert A. Conard, who has headed the ERDA and ABC _ USS. Forced to Restudy RadiationPeril 7 BY LARRY PRYOR The residents of an island in Mi- ” ener PCR Ye Times Stall Writer cronesia that received what was considered a small amount of radiation afler an H-bomb test in 1954 have developed a high rate of thyroid dis- ease and cancer. The sudden increase, which did not . become evident unuil about 22 years after the exposure to fallout, is forcing health physicists in the federal government te revise theories on dose rates that lead to adverse human effects, Their failure to predict or explain the cause of the disease has also gen- erated fear and mistrust among people on tie island, Uuirik Aloll, accord- ing lo recent reports from the Marsnalt Islands. The islands are part of the U.S. Trust Territory of the Pacific. Qne seneduled quarterly medical survey of the Ulirik islanders was cancealea Jast December and the American resident physician in Micronesia is being recalled, Tac Times has learned. POS sega eeORAGONPaar BIKINI ao ee a. “ ee Eb Be ey ODa et UTIANC medical program-in the Marshall IsJands for 23 years. "It turns out we were wrong,” Conard said in an interview, “but we did it in all sincerity and I’m afraid thé people have held that a2 gainst me somewhat.” Glenn Alcalay, 2 Peace Corps volunteer who lived on Utirik two years and returned to California this summer, said the increase in disease “has been an amazing psycholovicai ha ER oN “RONGERIK oh ge trauma to these peopie.” ea? oe a One recently reported case of AILINGNAE | /RONGELAP See thyroid cancer involved the young . me an son of an exposed person, ad that Pacific Ocean 0 ° 50 MILES 100 ROR ITSMC a erentoegmace ‘Let’s .face ft, the RADIOACTIVE CLOUD—After H-bombtest on Bikini, much atten»| U.S “7.77i of oofed,’ ° Sef said div cfti- tion was paid to the islands in center but fittle to Utirik, © research¢ IVISION, Times map Teiaetea hene fo BAS “The people of Ulirik are very distressed and angry as a result of the radiaticn,’ the chiefs of the atoll wrote the U.S. Energy Research and Development Administration (ERDA), which administers the med ~ iehtFopram in the islands related to radiaion disease, “The people feel that (he ERD A program is tit need of vast changes,” on has rail‘sed the possiSility ¢of citther ERDA and its predecessor, the second-pencration genetic effects or Atomic energy Commission, had exa- healtn problems from latent radiation. mined the 158 Utirik residents who The ERDA health program, which were exposed ta fatleut on March 1, “vas carried out under contract witht 3954, and laler treated 11 officially the Brookhaven National Laboratory reported cases of thyreid tumors, in Upton, N.Y., did not include exathree of them malignant. mination3 of children of exposed perenn iLthe recont develonnisnt ot sons and did not encompass genctic he tnue problem, tha residents > offects, Picase Turn to Pave 28, Col £ “The thesry was put forth that LVAD