Doctor Testifies That San Onofre Leaks Caused Leukemia

In a victory for a cancer victim suing the operators of the San Onofre nuclear power plant, a judge Thursday allowed an expert on the causes of cancer to testify that her cancer was caused by radiation leaks from the plant.

The testimony of Dr. Harry B. Demopoulos on behalf of Rung C. Tang brought vigorous protests from attorneys for Southern California Edison Co., who derided his credentials, his experiments on rats and cats, and his relationship to celebrities.

“We’re dealing in the arena of rank speculation that we have been wallowing in from day one,” Edison attorney Stephen G. Blitch said.

But U.S. District Judge Rudi Brewster overruled Blitch’s objections and allowed the testimony.

Demopoulos, a professor at New York University Medical School and author of the book “Cancer and the Environment,” said that Rung contracted myelogeneous leukemia because of her work as a Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspector at San Onofre during 1985 and 1986. Rung is suing Edison for damages.

Demopoulos spent several hours explaining the criteria used to determine cancer causation, including proximity to a known carcinogen, instances of the carcinogen in the workplace or environment, and the duration of those contamination episodes.

He noted that Tang worked close to radiation, that the radiation got loose throughout the plant and that the contamination lasted for many months. He added that she had no history of cancer in her immediate family and no known exposure to significant amounts of radiation other than her work at San Onofre.

As a hush fell over the jury, Demopoulos described the life of a cancer victim.

“They no longer consider themselves a human being,” he said. “They consider themselves stamped with a label that is dehumanizing.”

Radiation is the only known cause of myelogenous leukemia but cancer specialists say that there must be other causes because thousands of people with no known exposure to radiation get the disease. Blitch promised to call an expert who will testify that “99.9% of chronic myelogenous leukemia causes are unknown.”

Blitch noted that Demopoulos is not an tumor or blood disease specialist, that his medical research has not involved radiation or nuclear safety and that he has treated only a handful of leukemia patients.

He added that although Demopoulos, a pathologist, maintains a clinical practice, he has found time to treat Clint Eastwood, Muhammad Ali and Sylvester Stallone.

Blitch argued that while Demopoulos’ theories about the causes of cancer may be accurate in a general sense, they cannot be applied to a specific patient.

Tang’s lawyer, Suzelle Smith, read from Demopoulos’ resume, which includes 92 articles in medical journals, training in radiation at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology and training at the National Institutes of Health.

Tang, 44, is recuperating from a bone marrow transplant and too weak to attend the trial. At the time Tang worked at San Onofre, the plant had continual problems with leaking fuel rods and microscopic particles called “fuel fleas” and was fined by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for radiation safety violations.

In fact, a maintenance worker received a dose of radiation 100 times larger than considered safe and later was found to have suffered chromosome damage, according to Nuclear Regulatory Commission reports read to the jury by Demopoulos. Tang worked in the same area as that worker.

Her attorneys argue that Tang also was exposed to radiation and suffered chromosome damage that became cancer.

She was found to have leukemia in late 1992, six years after leaving San Onofre. Demopoulos testified that the latency period--that is, the time between exposure and onset--for radiation-caused leukemia is three to 10 years.