Data, preliminary analyses and mechanistic models

Abstract

The names Hiroshima, Chernobyl and Thalidomide are synonymous with twentieth century tragedies. Many years after the exploding of atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the effects of exposure to nuclear radiation on the survivors are quantifiable in terms of increased incidence of leukaemia, as described in the paper by Armitage and Doll (1962). An example involving chromosome aberration in survivors of Hiroshima is considered in Chapter 6. The drug Thalidomide had been prescribed as a safe hypnotic drug, but the winter of 1961 saw the horrifying reports of its use resulting in babies born with deformities of phocomelia, or micromclia. As Beedie and Davies (1981) ominously wrote, ‘It had not been tested in animals for teratogenicity, but thousands of babies born to mothers who had taken the drug during pregnancy provided the missing data.’