U-of-I lookes to document worker problems at MIddletown plant

Two meetings are being held in southeast Iowa this month in an effort to reach former employees of the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant in Middletown. Nuclear and conventional weapons were made there and workers may have been exposed to a variety of serious health hazards. Dr. Laurence Fuortes is a professor of occupational and environmental health at the University of Iowa. The Pentagon has asked the U-of-I to investigate the long-range health conditions of former nuclear weapons workers from the plant. Dr. Fuortes says his staff is now busy entering data from plant personnel files.While 40-thousand people worked at the plant near Burlington in its near-three decades of operation, it’s believed only two-to-four-thousand people worked with the nuclear weapons. The plant was open from 1947 to ’75. Fuortes says former plant workers don’t need to be concerned about security or secrecy. He says they aren’t interested in how to put together atomic weapons, only what types of material the people may’ve handled.Former workers will be offered medical evaluations. The first meeting is at seven p-m on Wednesday in Middletown at the Union Hall. The second meeting is scheduled for January 24th at 5:30 p-m at Burlington Memorial Auditorium.