Document EdvKD1vaKepvOGZpk4nqYkRox

x1 >/ J une IT, 1968 Mr. D. H. Soutar New York Office NBC-TV Program - Sellkoff Interview Dr. Selikoff'a propensity for publicity is well-known. In his televised discussion - copy attached -.repeated what he has said many times. ^ I wouldn't argue with him about the health risks of insulation workers. I saw much of that kind of work in engine rooms of ships under construction or being repaired during the war. The exposures to asbestos dust were enormous. Respirator-wearing was almost nil. So far as the danger to public health is concerned, Selikoff'a conjecturing, and that of others, reminds me of a past editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association in regard to the fallout controversy: "When the news media and the bureaucratic bubbleheads state that you may develop abnormalities in the fifth generation or tHe sixth or even the seventh, this is true. It may also occur in the eighth generation, but even the Bible goes only unto the seventh. You can't argue with that kind of logic. You may fall off a truck tomorrow and kill yourself, but you may not. You may die of heart disease while you are reading this editorial, but you may not. Also, you may get cancer from drinking cranberry Juice. This kind of political sloganry 'you may develop...,' 'you may be affected by...,''you may become...,' resembles tHe advertising sloganry: 'If you have leprosy and need salicylic acid, take aspirin.'" There is no proof at all that occasional asbestos fibers or other fibers, when inhaled by the ordinary citizen, do ASARCO ALL 0000055 any hann. The assumption that harm does occur is the same as that made by neophytes in toxicology who assume that tiny amounts of lead in the air are dangerous to public health. The occupational exposures to harmful airborne substances are one thing; public exposures are another. They are orders of magnitude apart, and toxicity and other harmful effects are matters of dose. Somehow theee concepts must be made clear to politicians and do-gooders who get into the act. K. N1mb KVN/mb Enel. cc: Dr. Pinto ^SARCO ALL 0000056