Citation

Moulder JE. Health Phys. 2014; 107(2): 164-171.

Affiliation

Center for Medical Countermeasures Against Radiological Terrorism, Radiation Oncology, Medical College of Wisconsin, 8701 Watertown Plank Road, Milwaukee, WI 53226.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, Health Physics Society, Publisher Lippincott Williams and Wilkins)

DOI

10.1097/HP.0000000000000082

PMID

24978287

PMCID

PMC4076685

Abstract

Soon after the 9-11 attacks, politicians and scientists began to question our ability to cope with a large-scale radiological terrorism incident. The outline of what was needed was fairly obvious: the ability to prevent such an attack, methods to cope with the medical consequences, the ability to clean up afterward, and the tools to figure out who perpetrated the attack and bring them to justice. The medical response needed three components: the technology to determine rapidly the radiation doses received by a large number of people, methods for alleviating acute hematological radiation injuries, and therapies for mitigation and treatment of chronic radiation injuries. Research done to date has shown that a realistic medical response plan is scientifically possible, but the regulatory and financial barriers to achieving this may currently be insurmountable.

Language: en