Some area residents believed to have donated baby teeth

Associated Press

Paul McCartney performed at the "Concert for New York" at New York's Madison Square Garden in this Oct. 20 file photo. Cartney witnessed the aftermath of the New York plane crash Monday from the window of a Concorde jet, which landed in the city minutes after the American Airlines jet went down.

By Scott Moyers ~ Southeast Missourian

Area residents who lived in St. Louis while they were children during the late 1950s or 1960s may be able to play a role in determining whether nuclear bomb testing caused health problems for people years later.

But that's only if their baby teeth were given to science instead of the tooth fairy.

"I'm positive some of the people who lived in St. Louis at the time and sent their teeth in have migrated to your area," said Jay M. Gould, director and founder of Radiation and Public Health Project. "It would be shocking if they hadn't."

In May, scientists discovered 85,000 baby teeth in a southwest St. Louis County bunker, where they had been stored and forgotten since the 1970s. The teeth were part of the famous St. Louis Baby Tooth Survey.

In that study, teeth were collected from thousands of children from 1959 to 1970 whose parents had sent the teeth to the Greater St. Louis Citizens Committee for Nuclear Information. They also sent cards with their name, address and birth date.

Gould said the survey was intended to help scientists figure out whether children were absorbing radioactive fallout from nuclear bomb tests in the West. The study found that children absorbed radioactive material, he said.

Needs more information

Gould and his project now want the owners of the teeth to contact his group. He said if there is a match, the person will be asked for a mailing address to receive a health questionnaire primarily via e-mail.

The one question that the teeth should be able to answer, once the project receives completed questionnaires, is whether there was an increase in cancer or other radiation-induced illnesses in donors born in the mid-1960s over those born in the early 1950s.

Since the story ran in the St. Louis media, Gould said the project has received 700 e-mails from tooth donors and there have been 2,100 visits to the Web site at www.radiation.com.

Gould appeared on National Public Radio and other media outlets.

"The St. Louis baby-boomer baby teeth, it turns out, can provide quick answers to many troubling questions about health effects," Gould said.

He said the chief revelation of the St. Louis study was that the level of radioactive material in the teeth of children born in the peak year 1964 was 50 times greater than for children born in the 1950.

While the decision to end above-ground bomb tests was made in 1963, the difference in levels was not known until 1970, Gould said, after the St. Louis study had been terminated.

Those who believe their teeth may be among the 85,000 from the survey can respond by mail at: Radiation and Public Health Project, P.O. Box 60, Unionville, N.Y., 10988; by phone at (212) 496-6787; or by e-mail at odiejoe@aol.com.

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137