4. A ban could lead some postal customers to improperly 
identify and package materials and mail them anyway. 
The Postal Service wishes to avoid the risk of substantial 
injury from potentially hazardous materials to postal employees 
and to the public through appropriate acceptance and handling 
procedures . 
The Service does not wish to have a negative impact on 
medical diagnosis, or medical research and laboratory 
certification capabilities. It does not want to increase medical 
costs or have such onerous rules that mailers will ignore 
packaging and labeling requirements and mail the potentially 
hazardous materials anyway. We must, however, consider the 
potential risk to the public and our employees in handling and 
delivering this material along with all other mail. We must 
either eliminate the risk, if possible, by refusing to accept 
this material, or minimize the risk to a point which is 
acceptable when considering all public health concerns. It may be 
possible to reduce the risk by reducing the quantity permitted 
for medical purposes per parcel, and requiring better packaging 
and more expeditious means of movement in the mail. 
We do not plan to go ahead with our rulemaking until these issues 
can be more fully explored. 
Recombinant DNA Research, Volume 13 
[393] 
