2 - 



effects of storage in the containers in xjhich they are original- 

 ly dispensed, only a small portion of this activity is reaching 

 the aea at present. 



Many of these elements will be concentrated by the marine 

 biota and it is worth considering what effect such accumulation 

 would have upon the marine biota itself and ultimately upon the 

 possible hazard to man. In terms of the hazard to the indivi- 

 dual marine species there is no evidence that concentrations of 

 elements comparable to the MFC established for drinking water 

 would have deleterious effects on marine organisms, even if they 

 lived their entire lifetime in such concentrations. As indica- 

 ted above, a very small area of the continental shelf of the 

 United States appears to be adequate to dilute the radioisotopes 

 to these concentrations, and it seems highly unlikely that any 

 species other than sedentary ones which are firmly attached to 

 the bottom would remain in such an area for more than a small 

 fraction of their life. 



In terms of the hazard to man, it is necessary to evaluate 

 the total potential intake from seafood as a source. It will 

 be remembered that the MFC was derived from the total body 

 burden on the assumption that an individual would drink about 

 15 liters of water weekly. The product of 15 x 103 cc and the 

 MFC (microcuries per cc.) thus is the weekly intake permissible 

 for the human body. It should furthermore be realized that such 

 an intake for a period of thirty years is required to develop 

 the permissible body burden. 



In contrast to the drinking of water^ man's habits In terms 

 of the eating of seafoods are extremely variable. According to 

 Taylor (l95lT the average U. S, consumption of seafoods is approxi- 

 mately 10 pounds per year. Comparable figures for other countries 

 are Prance, 20j Great Britain, [[Si Japan, 111 pounds per year. 

 The average consumption of seafood, however, has little signifi- 

 cance since large proportions of the population live far from 

 the sea coast and eat little or no fish or other marine products. 

 When compared to meat consumption as the sources of protein a man 

 would have to eat approximately four pounds of fish weekly in 

 order to match the average U, S, protein consumption. It has 

 seemed to us reasonable to take such a value as the extreme case 

 of an Individual subsisting almost entirely on fish as the source 

 of protein in his diet. 



The permissible seawater concentration ( PSC ) may be related 

 to the maximum permissible concentration by the following 

 equation: 



MFC X D = FSC X f X P 



In which D is the amount of water (cc) drunk in a week, f is the 

 concentration factor by marine organisms, and P is the amount of 

 seafood (kg x 10~3) consumed per week. The amount of fish con- 

 sumption in this equation must be expressed in terms of cubic 



