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MEDICAL DEPARTHMENT
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September 17, 1975
Senator Olympio T. Borja, Chairman
-Special Joint Committee Concerning Rongelap
and Utirik Atolls
Congress of Micronesia
_ Saipan, Mariana Islands
96950
Dear Senator Borja:
This is in response to a letter from Brian Farley (Aug. 27, 1975)
‘containing questions regarding the compensation of Rongelap and Utirik
people exposed to fallout.
I have numbered the questions on a copy of
your letter and present the following answers by these numbers:
. CL) It would not be feasible to grade compensation with regard to
degree of thyroid injury.in the surgical cases since it is not possible
to quantify degree of injury or amount of healthy thyroid tissue remain-
ing after surgery.
In.any event thyroid replacement therapy used restores
the normal metabolic state (dependent on thyroid function).
The thyroid
cancer cases following’ surgery have been asymptomatic and have shown no:
evidence of recurrence.
Such recurrence is extremely unlikely since it
is already well beyond the time (5 years) of usual recurrence.
In answer
to your query about the cases in whom the thyroid has ceased to function
we have recommended (see attached lettcr to Mr. Rice) inclusion for com-
pensation of the two young Rongelap men who had atrophy of the thyroia
with growth retardation. Also recommended for compensation was a Rongelap.
woman who had a nonthyroid neurofibroma surgically removed from her neck.
' This tumor may have been related to exposure.
(2) Due to their short radioactive life, none of the radioiodines
involved in thyroid tumor production remained on the island when the
' people moved back to Rongelap. Only small amounts of other isotopes
(principally 90sr and 137cs) remained, which unlike radioiodines are
not selectively absorbed by the thyroid gland.
‘Therefore the thyroid
dose from these isotopes and from a slight amount of ganma radiation
was far below that known to produce tumors of the thyroid or other
effects on the body. The finding of about the same incidence of such
‘tumors in the population living on an uncontaminated island in Likiep
atoll favored nonradiation involvement. The thyroid tumors in the
-Utirik population, one of which was malignant, have to be considered
in a different light since ‘the thyroids in this group received some
‘radiolodine exposure. llowever, the*dose veceived was quite low and
since the incidence of benign tumors of the thyroid was about the same
as in the Rongelap control and Likiep population it seems cxtremely un‘This contention is supported by
likely that radiation was involved.
the fact that most of the tumors were in the older age group (as found
unexposed populations) and. only one case.of nodularity developed in
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