The Honorable Wallace 0. Green Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary Territorial & International Affairs Augusc 8, 1980 Page Eight We submitted to you at the August 6, 1980 meeting a copy of Dr. Merliss' letter presenting his findings. A second copy is attached here. (Attachment 2) During his short visit, Dr. Merliss became aware of a shocking number of thyroid tumors, visual difficulties, birth anomolies and other disorders--medical problems strikingly similar to those reported by the people of Likiep. thyroid tumors, Dr. Merliss concluded: With regard to the "There appears to be little doubt that the tumors, benign or malignant, are radiation-induced. There are just too many of them to be anything else. Otherwise one would have to postulate that the Marshallese had a remarkably high incidence racially of tumors of the thyroid, this existing before 1946, and the old people I spoke to denied this. They denied that prior to the bombs there. wasS any particular epidemic of lumps in the neck. I cannot therefore accept the belief that the Marshall Islanders simply by virtue of their heredity have a tendency toward thyroid tumors." Dr. Merliss further stated that: “I think that these three: the tumors cf the thyroid including cancer, disturbances in vision probably due to cataracts, and deformities of birth are a part of the radiation injury, and that the continuing injury is in large part due to food-chain entry by long-lived radioactive elements. I strongly suspect that the leukemias were radiation induced." Dr. Merliss related an extremely disturbing account of the lack of medical care in Utirik and elsewhere in the Marshall Islands, as follows: "For example, there was a general complaint of dimming vision some five or six years ago on Utric (sic), probably due to an increased incidence ° of cataracts. None of the people from Utric (sic) that I spoke to told me that any physician examined their eyes in such a way as to be able to recognize cataracts. Instead I was told that two boxes of eyeglasses were shipped to the island being of various models and frames, and the people were to come in and choose whichever eyeglass seemed to