09/04/02

More than a half-million pills that can protect people in the event of a nuclear power plant attack or accident have been sitting in a warehouse somewhere in Columbus since June.

The Ohio Department of Health received the free potassium iodide pills from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. State officials are still working on a plan to distribute the pills to county health departments in October.

Ohioans living or working within 10 miles of a nuclear power plant are expected to receive the pills in January, said Roger Suppes, chief of the Ohio Department of Health's Bureau of Radiation Protection.

The Perry nuclear power plant in Lake County is 35 miles east of Cleveland.

The Davis-Besse plant is 70 miles to the west.

But if there is a radiation release at the Beaver Valley nuclear plant, just across the border in Pennsylvania, residents there will have an advantage over their Ohio neighbors.

More than 640,000 Pennsylvanians, including 18,000 near Beaver Valley, began receiving potassium iodide pills from the Pennsylvania Department of Health two weeks ago. Their neighbors in Ohio will have to wait.

"We made a conscious effort once we had it [potassium iodide] to get it out there as quickly as we could," said Pennsylvania Department of Health spokesman Richard McGarvey. He added that Gov. Mark Schweiker "didn't want it sitting in a warehouse for six months."

Even though the country's nuclear plants remain on the highest security alert following the Sept. 11 attacks, Suppes said it was not urgent to get 639,000 pills to the estimated 319,500 Ohioans eligible for them.

"We want to make sure we do it right," he said. "We're trying to put together a plan that encourages participation."

The plan will be a model for distribution of other drugs in the national pharmaceutical stockpile, such as the antibiotic Cipro, if necessary, he said.

The potassium iodide pills prevent thyroid cancer by keeping the thyroid from absorbing radioactive iodine, one of dozens of radioactive gases that can be released from a nuclear reactor. The NRC first recommended the pills after the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania.

The drug must be taken within four hours of exposure and loses its effect after eight hours.

So far, 16 states have received the free pills from the NRC, said Patricia Milligan, an emergency-planning specialist at the commission. The pills have been distributed in Pennsylvania and parts of New York, New Jersey and Vermont. But Pennsylvania isn't about to share its supply.

"What we got from the federal government was for residents of Pennsylvania," said McGarvey.

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:

sjaffe@plaind.com, 216-999-4822