Public health effects, radon

Steinhausler (1987) and Martell (1987) review the dosimetric models and related model studies. Their view is that there are still very large uncertainties in the existing data and in the extrapolation from the exposure and response data for underground miners and experimental animals to the health effects of the radon progeny levels to which the general public is exposed. B.L. Cohen (1987) describes his work to relate radon measurements with lung cancer rates for various geographical areas to test the concept of a dose threshold. 

Warner, Kenneth E., David Mendez, and Paul N. Courant. 1996. Toward a More Realistic Appraisal of the Lung Cancer Risk from Radon The Effects of Residential Mobility. American Journal of Public Health 86 1222-27. 

United States Public Health Service (1957) Control of radon and daughters in uranium mines and calculations on biological effects. Washington D.C. 

The results of the studies on miners have been used as a basis for estimating the risks to the general public from exposures to radon in homes. There is considerable controversy over this topic. Although the health effects due to the high radon exposures experienced by the miners have been well established, the risks at the lower exposure levels in residences are difficult to establish due to uncertainties in the dose-response curve and the confounding effects of smoking and urbanization. The reader is referred to extensive documentation by the National Academy of Sciences (1998) and the National Institute of Health (1994) for more information. 

Radon in human tissues is not detectable by routine medical testing. However, several of its decay products can be detected in urine and in lung and bone tissue. These tests, however, are not generally available to the public and are of limited value since they cannot be used to accurately determine how much radon you were exposed to, nor can they be used to predict whether you will develop harmful health effects. You will find more information on methods used to investigate levels of radon in Chapters 2 and 6. 

Section 104(i)(5) of CERCLA directs the Administrator of ATSDR (in consultation with the Administrator of EPA and agencies and programs of the Public Health Service) to assess whether adequate information on the health effects of radon is available. Where adequate information is not available, ATSDR, in conjunction with the National Toxicology Program (NTP), is required to assure the initiation of a program of research designed to determine the health effects (and techniques for developing methods to determine such health effects) of radon. 

Morken D. 1980. The biological and health effects of radon a review. National Bureau of Standards Special Publication 581, Proceedings of a roundtable discussion of radon in buildings held at NBS, Gaithersburg, MD, 21-26. 

EPA began to publicly explore privatizing the RMP in a public workshop in May 1996. The Agency reasoned that since the implementation of the RMP a decade before (i) the radon services industry had matured sufficiently to make direct EPA involvement in proficiency determinations no longer necessary, (ii) approximately half the states had stronger radon public health and consumer protection activities, and (iii) the private sector might be able to operate the program cost effectively. After a public stakeholder process,... 

Let us first examine the virtues of information acquisition by bureaucracies. Information acquisition includes two separate activities the development of basic knowledge and its dissemination. Traditionally, even most market-oriented economists have argued that the development of basic knowledge has public-good character-isfics and, fhus, will not be provided optimally by private firms. Two examples of basic research discussed earlier in this book are knowledge about the effects of radon exposure on human health and the database of animal tests that Ames and his colleagues constructed. 

A wealth of new information about radiation exposure over the past decade prompted the revision of the BSS. First and foremost, a study of the biological effects of radiation doses received by the survivors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki suggested that exposure to low-level radiation was more likely to cause harm than previously estimated. Other developments—notably the nuclear accident at Three Mile Island in 1979 and that at Chernobyl in 1986, with its unprecedented transboundary contamination—had a profound effect on the public perception of the potential danger from radiation exposure. There were serious accidents with radiation sources used in medicine and industry in Mexico, Brazil, El Salvador and other countries. In addition, more has been discovered about natural radiation—such as household radon—as a cause of concern for health. Finally, natural radiation exposures of workers such as miners, who were not thought of as radiation workers, were discovered to be much higher than had been realised. 

---