Methods were developed to calculate individual estimates of exposure and dose with associated uncertainties for a sub-cohort (1,857) of 115,329 military veterans who participated in at least one of seven series of atmospheric nuclear weapons tests or the TRINITY shot carried out by the United States. The tests were conducted at the Pacific Proving Grounds and the Nevada Test Site. Dose estimates to specific organs will be used in an epidemiological study to investigate leukemia and male breast cancer. Previous doses had been estimated for the purpose of compensation and were generally high-sided to favor the veteran's claim for compensation in accordance with public law. Recent efforts by the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) to digitize the historical records supporting the veterans’ compensation assessments make it possible to calculate doses and associated uncertainties. Our approach builds upon available film badge dosimetry and other measurement data recorded at the time of the tests and incorporates detailed scenarios of exposure for each veteran based on personal, unit, and other available historical records. Film badge results were available for approximately 25% of the individuals, and these results assisted greatly in reconstructing doses to unbadged persons and in developing distributions of dose among military units. This article presents the methodology developed to estimate doses for selected cancer cases and a 1% random sample of the total cohort of veterans under study.
Carbon tetrachloride is a degreasing agent that was used at the Rocky Flats Plant (RFP) in Colorado to clean product components and equipment. The chemical is considered a volatile organic compound and a probable human carcinogen. During the time the plant operated (1953-1989), most of the carbon tetrachloride was released to the atmosphere through building exhaust ducts. A smaller amount was released to the air via evaporation from open-air burn pits and ground-surface discharge points. Airborne releases from the plant were conservatively estimated to be equivalent to the amount of carbon tetrachloride consumed annually by the plant, which was estimated to be between 3.6 and 180 Mg per year. This assumption was supported by calculations that showed that most of the carbon tetrachloride discharged to the ground surface would subsequently be released to the atmosphere. Atmospheric transport of carbon tetrachloride from the plant to the surrounding community was estimated using a Gaussian Puff dispersion model (RATCHET). Time-integrated concentrations were estimated for nine hypothetical but realistic exposure scenarios that considered variation in lifestyle, location, age, and gender. Uncertainty distributions were developed for cancer slope factors and atmospheric dispersion factors. These uncertainties were propagated through to the final risk estimate using Monte Carlo techniques. The geometric mean risk estimates varied from 5.2 x 10(-6) for a hypothetical rancher or laborer working near the RFP to 3.4 x 10(-9) for an infant scenario. The distribution of incremental lifetime cancer incidence risk for the hypothetical rancher was between 1.3 x 10(-6) (5% value) and 2.1 x 10(-5) (95% value). These estimates are similar to or exceed estimated cancer risks posed by releases of radionuclides from the site.
Both red bone marrow and male breast doses with associated uncertainty have been reconstructed for a 1,982-person subset of a cohort of 114, 270 military personnel (referred to as "atomic veterans") who participated in U.S. atmospheric nuclear weapons testing from 1945 to 1962. The methods used to calculate these doses and corresponding uncertainty have been reported in detail by Till et al. in an earlier publication. In this current article we report the final results of those calculations. These doses are being used in a case-cohort design epidemiological investigation of leukemia and male breast cancer. This cohort of atomic veterans is one component in a broader-scope study of approximately one million U.S. persons designed to investigate risk from chronic low-dose radiation exposure. Doses to the atomic veterans in this sub-cohort were relatively low, with approximately two-thirds receiving red bone marrow doses <5 mGy and only four individuals receiving a red bone marrow dose >50 mGy. The average red bone marrow dose for members of the sub-cohort was 5.9 mGy. Doses to male breast were approximately 20% higher than red bone marrow doses. The uncertainty in the estimated doses was relatively low, considering relevant personnel dosimetry was available for only about 25% of the subjects, and most of the doses were reconstructed from film badges worn by co-workers or from the individual's military record and military unit activities. The average coefficient of variation for the individual dose estimates was approximately 0.5, comparable to the uncertainty in doses estimated for the Japanese A-bomb survivors. Although the reconstructed red bone marrow doses were about 36% lower on average than the conservative doses previously estimated by the military for compensation, the overall correlation was quite good, suggesting that the estimates of doses from external exposure by the military for all ∼115,000 cohort members could be adjusted appropriately and used in further epidemiological analyses.
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