Physicians, reformers and occupational disease: the discovery of radium poisoning

Teenage girls and young women, whose job it was to apply luminous paint containing radium to watches during World War I, were among the first industrial radiation poisoning victims in the United States. This paper recounts both the story of how their afflictions became "recognized" occupational diseases and of the tangled web of governmental-industrial-academic collusion (largely based on industrial funding of research and experts) which delayed this recognition. It shows how these industrial-academic arrangements led to the establishment of the major academic training programs in occupational medical and industrial hygiene still in existence. Using historical sources, this study provides evidence of moral lapses by medical researchers, including directly lying to the victims, withholding data on the true extent of illness and radiation contamination and of distorting evidence. The pivotal role of the Consumers League and of Dr. Alice Hamilton in establishing the truth of the radium dial painting poisonings is discussed.