MORTALITY AMONG THE OFFSPRING (F1) OF ATOMIC-BOMB SURVIVORS, 1946-85

We compare the mortality in the years 1946-85 in a cohort of 31,159 ch ildren born to parents one or both of whom were exposed to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (a parental gonadal dose greater-tha n-or-equal-to 0.01 Sv) with that in a control group of 41,069 children . The average gonadal dose for the exposed parents was 0.435 Sv. The m ean age of the cohorts was 28.8 years. In the greater-than-or-equal-to 0.01 Sv dose group 1,253 deaths were observed in the subset of childr en both of whose parents have been assigned DS86 doses. 3.2% were attr ibuted to cancers, 72.9% to all diseases except neoplasms. These propo rtions in the 0 Sv dose group were about the same. Based on a linear r elative risk model, no statistically significant increase in the morta lity attributable to diseases other than neoplasms is noted following parental exposure, the excess relative risk being 0.030 (+/- 0.046) pe r sievert based on the DS86 doses (RBE of neutrons = 20). For fatal ca ncer, no statistically significant effect of parental radiation dose w as also observed. An analysis based on the full sample, using not only the DS86 dose group but also ad hoc dose group, yields essentially th e same results as the analysis restricted to the DS86 dose group.