II 

108TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. 2047

To amend the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program 

Act of 2000 to include certain former nuclear weapons program workers 

in the Special Exposure Cohort under the compensation program established by that Act. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

FEBRUARY 2, 2004

Mr. BOND introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to 

the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 

A BILL

To amend the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 to include certain former 

nuclear weapons program workers in the Special Exposure Cohort under the compensation program established 

by that Act.

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. FINDINGS. 

4 Congress finds that—

5 (1) energy workers at the former Mallinkrodt 

6 facilities (including the St. Louis downtown facility, 

7 the Weldon Springs facility, and the Hematite facil-
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1 ity) were exposed to levels of radionuclides and ra2 dioactive materials that were much greater than the 

3 current maximum allowable Federal standards; 

4 (2) the Mallinkrodt workers at the St. Louis 

5 site were exposed to excessive levels of airborne ura6 nium dust relative to the standards in effect during 

7 the time, and many workers were exposed to 200 

8 times the preferred levels of exposure; 

9 (3)(A) the chief safety officer for the Atomic 

10 Energy Commission during the Mallinkrodt-St. 

11 Louis operations described the facility as 1 of the 2 

12 worst plants with respect to worker exposures; 

13 (B) workers were excreting in excess of a milli14 gram of uranium per day causing kidney damage; 

15 and 

16 (C) a recent epidemiological study found excess 

17 levels of nephritis and kidney cancer from inhalation 

18 of uranium dusts; 

19 (4) the Department of Energy has admitted 

20 that those workers were subjected to risks and had 

21 their health endangered as a result of working with 

22 these highly radioactive materials; 

23 (5) the Department of Energy reported that 

24 workers at the Weldon Springs feed materials plant 
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1 handled plutonium and recycled uranium, which are 

2 highly radioactive; 

3 (6) the National Institute of Occupational Safe4 ty and Health admits that—

5 (A) the operations at the St. Louis down6 town site consisted of intense periods of proc7 essing extremely high levels of radionuclides; 

8 and 

9 (B) the Institute has virtually no personal 

10 monitoring data for workers prior to 1948; 

11 (7) the National Institute of Occupational Safe12 ty and Health has informed claimants and their sur13 vivors at those 3 sites that if they are not inter14 viewed as a part of the dose reconstruction process, 

15 it—

16 (A) would hinder the ability of the Insti17 tute to conduct dose reconstruction for the 

18 claimant; and 

19 (B) may result in a dose reconstruction 

20 that incompletely or inaccurately estimates the 

21 radiation dose to which the energy employee 

22 named in the claim had been exposed; 

23 (8) the Department of Health and Human 

24 Services published the first notice of proposed rule25 making concerning the Special Exposure Cohort on 
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1 June 25, 2002, and as of January 27, 2004, the 

2 rule has yet to be finalized; and 

3 (9) many of those former workers have died 

4 while waiting for the proposed rule to be finalized, 

5 including some claimants who were waiting for dose 

6 reconstruction to be completed. 

7 SEC. 2. DEFINITION OF MEMBER OF THE SPECIAL EXPO8 SURE COHORT. 

9 Section 3621(14) of the Energy Employees Occupa10 tional Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (42 

11 U.S.C. 7384l(14)) is amended—

12 (1) by redesignating subparagraph (C) as sub13 paragraph (D); and 

14 (2) by inserting after subparagraph (B) the fol15 lowing: 

16 ‘‘(C) The employee was so employed for a 

17 number of work days aggregating at least 45 

18 workdays at a facility operated under contract 

19 to the Department of Energy by Mallinkrodt 

20 Incorporated or its successors (including the St. 

21 Louis downtown or ‘Destrahan’ facility during 

22 any of calendar years 1942 through 1958, the 

23 Weldon Springs feed materials plant facility 

24 during any of calendar years 1958 through 

25 1966, and the Hematite facility during any of 
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1 calendar years 1958 through 1969), and during 

2 the employment—

3 ‘‘(i)(I) was monitored through the use 

4 of dosimetry badges for exposure at the 

5 plant of the external parts of an employ6 ee’s body to radiation; or 

7 ‘‘(II) was monitored through the use 

8 of bioassays, in vivo monitoring, or breath 

9 samples for exposure at the plant to inter10 nal radiation; or 

11 ‘‘(ii) worked in a job that had expo12 sures comparable to a job that is mon13 itored, or should have been monitored, 

14 under standards of the Department of En15 ergy in effect on the date of enactment of 

16 this subparagraph through the use of do17 simetry badges for monitoring external ra18 diation exposures, or bioassays, in vivo 

19 monitoring, or breath samples for internal 

20 radiation exposures, at a facility.’’.

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