Supporting our Nation's Security, Energy and Health

For week of August 15, 2004 Eric Rasmussen
SUPPORTING OUR NATION'S SECURITY, ENERGY AND HEALTH
Guest opinion submitted by Idaho Senator Mike Crapo
The events of the last several years have heightened this nation's awareness of the need to take measures to provide safety for our citizens and have underscored the importance of professions critical to that effort. I am concerned about a looming shortage in one of those professions - health physics - that threatens to jeopardize the quality of our environment, the health of the American people and the safety of our workers. For decades, ionizing radiation has been beneficial to humans, from treating cancer to generating electrical power. Homeland security depends on the use of radiation-producing instruments to screen people and cargo for contraband materials and radiation detection instruments to prevent and respond to radiological terrorist events. The largest user of radiation and radioactive materials is the health care industry in the development of drugs and the diagnosis and treatment of disease. When used in large quantity in a threatening or unsafe way, however, ionizing radiation can be very dangerous. Many industries, medical facilities, defense plants and research laboratories demand professionals who understand radiation hazards and their prevention and control. Health physicists are radiation safety professionals trained to protect the environment, public and workers as radiation and nuclear technologies are used to support our nation's energy, health and security needs. The national shortage of radiation safety experts is due, in part, to inadequate support for undergraduate and graduate scholarships and fellowships, inadequate funding for university research programs and an aging workforce. Current projections indicate that 76 percent of the nation's professional nuclear workforce could retire over the next five to ten years. At the same time, the number of U.S students graduating from health physics programs with either a bachelor, master or doctorate degree declined 55 percent between 1995 and 2002. The health physics program at Idaho State University, for example, one of the largest in the nation, has seen declining enrollment since the mid-1990s. In the last several years, long-standing health physics programs at the University of North Carolina and the University of Michigan's School of Public Health have been abolished. The supply of bachelor degree nuclear science, engineering and health physics personnel in the United States is lower than the number of jobs available, resulting in a critical shortage. While enrollment is largely dependent on the interest of students, federal funding has been crucial in furthering the development of health physics professionals. I have been working with my colleagues in the Congress to encourage and enable the Department of Energy's Office of Nuclear Science, Engineering and Technology to begin providing support for energy-related health physics academic programs. I have also personally requested that the Environmental Protection Agency include health physics under its existing university grants programs for environmental research. Clearly, other Federal agencies with direct responsibilities for radiation safety in national security, the environment and the workplace, such as the Departments of Homeland Security, Labor, and Health and Human Services, have a role in supporting these academic programs - and I will continue to encourage them to do so. Human resources in this area are an essential part of our future energy, health care and homeland security efforts. Sustaining and developing professionals in technical fields like health physics is vital to innovation and the command of new technologies. There must be strong coordination between government agencies, university programs, laboratories like the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Lab, and industry to recruit, educate and utilize personnel in these important fields. We must take action to ensure that the nation can continue to provide for the safe use of radiation and nuclear technologies to support our national, economic and homeland security needs in the future.