Attachment 6
                                 
                                 
    Report by Dr. Patricia Durbin dated December 10, 1971, re:
  "Dr. Wright Langham, of the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory,
      was the biochemist who performed the Pu analyses...."
                            Copy; 1 p.
                      ACHRE No. DOE-121294-D
Dr. Wright Langham, of the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, was
the biochemist who performed the Pu analyses of the excreta and
other samples obtained from the first Pu-injected person, HP-12. 
Dr. Langham was at the Metallurgical Laboratory in Chicago at the
time.  Later he transferred to Los Alamos, and in the early days
there received and analyzed the samples obtained from the 11 HP
series cases studied at Rochester.  It was a joint effort and
involved many people.  Classification (prolonged) and the passage
of many years before even classified publication of the findings
led to his eventual responsibility for analysis and publication of
the results.  He is, I believe, distressed by this and other
aspects of the study itself--particularly the fact that the
injected people in the HP series were unaware that they were the
subjects of an experiment.  (I am unsure of the circumstances
surrounding the Berkeley and Chicago people, but at least two of
the Berkeley cases were given some indication that they were being
given some radioactive material.) Dr. Langham has been associated
in the minds of many in the radiation protection field with only
this one aspect of the subject, and the study itself has been
associated with the Los Alamos Laboratory.  I believe he grew very
weary of attending meetings and conferences at which he was
expected to discuss this material over and over again.  I also
believe that in retrospect he wishes that there had been some other
way to obtain the needed relationships between Pu excretion and
body burden.

     I had a long telephone conversation with Dr. Langham after I
returned from Rochester.  He was very interested in what I had been
able to find, and wants to have some fraction of any excretion
samples that can be obtained now sent to the Los Alamos Laboratory
for duplicate analysis and comparison with their results on
accidentally exposed occupational workers.  He said that if such
material were available, the Los Alamos group would be interested
in participating, but that they did not want to be directly
responsible nor in direct contact with whomever was actually
obtaining samples.  He summed up his feelings as follows; "I'll be
delighted to hold your coats while you other fellows fight."

     Over the years since 1951 when the report of the original
findings was issued as LA-1151, no one had suggested follow-up most
likely because "that was Wright Langham's study".  When I began
looking at the excretion data from the individual cases, I wrote to
him for help in clearing up some questionable details, and later
telephoned him on several occasions.  He always encouraged me to go
after whatever information I could put together and indicated that
he felt someone should undertake the effort.  The information to be
gained would be of great value, but he did not wish to be
responsible for locating it.  I think this sums up the matter,
although my prose can hardly do justice to what are obviously
deeply held doubts about the study itself and to my strong
impression that he justifiably resents the pervasive influence on
his whole professional life of Pu in general and the human study in
particular.
               Patricia W. Durbin  December 10, 1971