Letters Sent to Arthur Roeder [A. Roeder], February 17, 1925

COPY HARVARD UNIVERSITY School of Public Health 55 Van Dyke Street, Boston, Hassachusetts Department of Physiology February 17,1925. Mr. Arthur Roeder, United States Radium Corporation, 30 Charch 3t., New York Cityl My dear Mr. Roeder: Several days ago I received a request to spenk at the coming annual meeting of the American Medical Association, in Atlantic City. I enclose a cony of the note. You will observe that Dr. F. L. Hoffman is listed as scheduled to speak on Radium Necrosis. Knowing that Dr. Hoffman came from Newark, I folt reasonably certain that his paper mast deal with an account of cages of necrosis of the jay, which are well known to have occurred among your employees. It has happened that since receiving this information from Dr. Draper, I have had an opportunity to read over a report by Dr. Hoffman on the situat- ion, and it i's the report which I imagine will make the basis of his talk in Atlantic City. As you know, papers read at thege meetings of the American Medical Association become the property of the Association, and are published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It is thus evident that within a rather short time the cages of necrosie occurring in your employees are going to be made public property, and that they are going to be ascribed without qualifications of any sort to radium, and it is furthermore apparent that when this pronouncement is made it will be unaccompanied by any information that your company has made a decided effort to get to the bottom of the affair. Dr. Hoffman mentions in his paper that the condition has been invest- igated by the Harvard Medical School, and by the State Authorities of New Jergey, and that nothing has come of these inquirires. He than presents his ow material which is unqualifiably in support of the idea that radium has done this damage, and that drastic meagures should be uged to prevent the possibility of work of this kind being carried out except under very exceptional conditions. He montios your company and your euployees by name.e It is therefore clear that you are not only going to be faced by a very definite accusation from an individual whoge word carries weight, but you are not going to be given credit for the gerious effort you have made to find out what is the matter in Orange; and you will not be given credit for the fact that you have had in your hands, and have made use of recommendationsfrom the Harvard School of Public Health designed to allay the possible danger which may exist in the use of Undark. In view of these facts, I am sending you a general statement of the work done by us for you, making it clear that this work was at your request, and emphasizing the recommendations for rolief made by us. It strikes me that it can only be to your interest to see the publication of this material in this form, in the