eee February 18, 1971 — THRU: POP ese Loan 674 W. W. Burr, Deputy Direcror, DBM’ 77/4 NOTES ON MEETING WITH LT. COL. WILLIAM BD, omy an Mb tae tN ene Files e ene DS ROWELL, AIR FORCE SURGEON CENERAL'S OFFICE, FEBRUARY 17, 1971, 10:00 A.M. Br. Still and I met with Col. Howell to discuss the status of his efforts _in folloving up the 23 airmen exposed to 78 rads whole body doze ’on “Rongerik following the March 1, 1954 detonation on Bikini. Ue cold us ‘thet three men vere stil] in the service and he had had pnysical exemina-~ Sons carried out oa thea. About ten men had more or less dropped out . Of sight as of 1963 or so and would have to be located. The resainder “““had at some time made “claims on the Veterans Adainistrarion and the _VA, therefore, had medical aad other records on them; the records were t ' } q t “~"not necesegarily current. Gols Howell clearly was concerned about the Air Porce acting responsibly 7 _toward these pen but felt thee. there must be a balance between seeing “that they pot proper medical supervision as against converting them into _ bypochondetacs, generating claims against the Government, setting precedents, etc, LEG . ot aea are y BT . A we i ‘: =. favhiiet oo rn ar an . Comer ow i pe fF ns He expreesed interest in cooperating and/or collaborating with Dr. Conard and fadicated that he woulc lika to visit Breokhaven wren it became conventenc, To that end ve agreed that I would call Sr. Conard and would then see that he and Dr. Conard became better acquainted by telephone. The idea of this was to withdraw DSM ro the sidelines, leaving toe principals te work topether,. . LN sta I have sent Col. Howell 2 copy of my letter to Dr. Conard, dated January 12, 1971, describing the understandings I wad arrived at with DASA and the VA, giving Special attention to the ethical considerations chat night apply to Conard's examination of these people. Before leaving, Dr. Still and I asked if he had any plans for the larger number of aircraft pilots who flew through clouds of fallout collecting @erial samples. He indicated that be had considered this bur bad not taken it up because, (a) the doses were small; (b) a pilot who got any kind of a sfenificanc cose was given other duties; and (c) there were quite a large number of pilots who had been assigned to other misstons. On the whole his response to the pilot evpesures added up to a negative. Rit AD Sritjs mi; ink igs ge: HDR H. D. Bruner, M.D. Assistant Director Med. Br. Division of Biology and Medicine Med. Br, runer O78 7/71 Dr. Stlleg d ETStil? Wosucl pycokestera weey7 5) a9 KK€ Dep . Die. BES T Ce S008 7182 COPY AVAILABLE aIf OA