Savannah River Site Health Effects Subcommittee (SRSHES) Meeting

Executive Summary

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List of Acronyms
	ATSDR  Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry  NCEH  National Center for Environmental Health  OBT  Organically-Bound Tritium SRSHES  Savannah River Site Health Effects Subcommittee

During the opening session of the SRSHES meeting on September 5-6, 2002, the June 6, 2002 meeting minutes were unanimously approved with the changes as noted in the record and a status report was provided for all current action items.

Environmental monitoring and surveillance programs have been established by SRS, Georgia and South Carolina. All three programs conduct the following activities: collect samples from a variety of environmental media; evaluate contaminant pathways that may affect the public; assess samples on a weekly, biweekly or monthly basis; analyze samples for ions of interest and all radionuclides; publish data results in annual reports; and disseminate the findings to the public. Since tritium is a major contributor to all contaminant pathways at SRS, all three programs specifically focus on tritium.

SRSHES is an advisory committee chartered under the Federal Advisory Committee Act that must meet requirements for public announcements of meetings, charter renewals, detailed minutes, balanced membership, conflicts of interest, public participation, as well as roles and responsibilities for the designated federal official, chair and members.

ATSDR reviewed data, addressed uncertainties, filled data gaps, developed dose calculations and formed an expert panel to determine the feasibility of conducting a health consultation on tritium exposures. Total annual doses of tritium and OBT were found to be below levels of public health concern. Protective assumptions were found to be adequate to account for uncertainties in monitoring and estimating dose. Estimated tritium doses were not found to warrant the collection of additional OBT data. Actual OBT releases from SRS were found to be negligible.

ATSDR will finalize and distribute the iodine-131 case study during the next SRSHES meeting; collaborate with the Outreach Workgroup to develop site-specific health education materials; and assist in updating and disseminating the SRSHES brochure.

The SRSHES workgroups made the following reports. The Community Summary and Proactive Workgroups have been eliminated. The Outreach Workgroup will present updated versions of both the SRSHES brochure and web site at the next meeting. The Membership Workgroup will poll 12 members whose terms expire on June 30, 2003 to determine their interest in reapplying for another three-year term. The Epidemiologic Data Workgroup will follow up on several outstanding issues to determine whether SRSHES should become involved in epidemiologic activities related to SRS.

The Agenda Workgroup will gather previous meeting minutes to identify outstanding agenda items and determine whether any topics are still relevant. The Scenario Workgroup described current profiles for the rural family, urban/suburban family, delivery person and outdoors person scenarios. SRSHES agreed by consensus to forward the four scenarios to NCEH for further evaluation in the screening process. The workgroup is still gathering information for the family living near the river and migrant worker family scenarios. NCEH will refine the existing scenarios by developing a range of historical doses persons received from the site.

During a discussion of new SRSHES business, action and agenda items raised during the meeting were reviewed; topics to be placed on the next agenda were agreed to by consensus. The Chair opened the floor for public comment at all times as designated on the agenda. The next SRSHES meeting is scheduled for March 13-14, 2003 in Columbia, South Carolina; Aiken, South Carolina; Charleston, South Carolina; or Atlanta, Georgia. The following SRSHES meeting is scheduled for September 4-5, 2003.