ATOMIC WEAPONS AGAINST CANCER — LOCKARD 271 



owner of all facilities for the production of fissionable material 

 * * * " Since all fissionable material is produced at the Com- 

 mission's national laboratories (Oak Ridge, Brookhaven, and the 

 Argonne Laboratory in Chicago) or at other laboratories that exe- 

 cute the program of the Commission (e. g., Los Alamos and the Uni- 

 versity of California), the availability of isotopes depends upon 

 the policy of the Commission. There is, furthermore, the explicit 

 injunction in the Atomic Energy Act that the Commission "exercise 

 its powers in such manner as to insure the continued conduct of re- 

 search and development activities" in, among several fields, the "utili- 

 zation of fissionable and radioactive materials for medical, biological, 

 health, or military purposes." In obedience to this provision and 

 in recognition of the scientific need for its products, the Atomic 

 Energy Commission is engaged in a cancer program, one part of a 

 huge program in biology and medicine that is costing several mil- 

 lions of dollars a year. 



This cancer program in general can be divided into four activities. 

 In the first place, there is free distribution by the AEC of radio- 

 isotopes to hospitals, medical schools, and clinics. Because the cost 

 of radioisotopes has held back cancer research, the AEC is making 

 available to qualified cancer-research workers in this country with- 

 out cost, save for a small handling charge, all radioisotopes on the 

 public market. At first the Commission made a free distribution 

 of three radioisotopes for cancer work: radioactive iodine (I^^^), 

 radioactive phosphorus (P^^), and radioactive sodium (Na^*), the 

 first two especially valuable. Among the radioisotopes recently de- 

 clared free, those most valuable in cancer research or therapy are 

 radioactive carbon (C"), radioactive cobalt (Co""), and radioactive 

 gold (Au^9«). 



Secondly, the Commission gives financial and scientific support to 

 certain research projects outside its own laboratories. In April of 

 1949 there were 78 such research studies in biology and medicine. 



In the third place, the Commission, through one of its agencies, 

 is studying the incidence and types of cancer in the survivors of the 

 bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. So far the studies have not 

 shown any increase in cancer or in abnormal children, stillbirths, or 

 miscarriages. 



And fourth, the Commission is committed to providing facilities 

 at its own installations for clinical research in cancer. One such 

 facility, now being established at the University of Chicago, is part 

 of what may be described as the first complete and self-sufficing cen- 

 ter for cancer research. 



Never until recently have all these necessary elements — the re- 

 search laboratory, the cyclotron, and the pile — been brought into 



