we know whether it should be five parts or 10 parts or two parts or 20 parts. So I would hesitate to say. I am certainly not in a position. and we are not in a position to set any tolerance level or even suggest one because we do not know enough about it.

Senator HART. My question was not whether nine parts was the right figure. A figure of nine or 90 might be fixed, but at the present time it is five. If the sampling of chubs continues to show DDT ranging around nine parts, as long as five is the maximum amount permitted, then doesn't it in effect destroy the commercial chub fishery?

Mr. CARBINE. It destroys the commercial chub market; yes. They cannot be sold if this is ever enforced.

Senator HART. Do you have any idea how long it might take, if we were able to completely shut off the quantity of DDT pouring into Lake Michigan, before the level in the chubs would drop?

Mr. CARBINE. I have not any idea. I do not know whether anyone has any solution to that problem. It is going to take a long time, I am afraid.

By the way, most of the reference has been to the commercial fishery being eliminated and these fish that cannot be sold. After all, some of these fish are caught by anglers and are eaten by anglers. And if the medical aspects of this are what we are led to believe, the sportsman should not be eating them either. In other words, if this is so important, there will be no fishery, sport or commercial, on the Great Lakes.

Senator HART. That sort of gets us back to our original comment about how we react to labels on packages.

Mr. CARBINE. Yes, sir. I just carry this around, you realize; I do not smoke them hardly at all.

Senator HART. What would you recommend for both State and Federal Government action, if we are going to preserve a strong fish industry on Lake Michigan?

Mr. CARBINE. Well, to keep a sport and commercial fishery going, I think we are going to have to stop all pollution and outlaw all pesticides. We have gone too far now. I do not see that we can tolerate any more. We have got to get this stuff out of the lakes and put it elsewhere. I could not say where that should be.

Senator HART. Mr. Webber.

Mr. WEBBER. No, sir.

Senator HART. Mr. Meserve.
Mr. MESERVE. No, thank you.

Senator HART. Thanks very much.

And next, the District Director of Food and Drug in Detroit, Mr. Thomas Brown.

STATEMENT OF THOMAS BROWN, DISTRICT DIRECTOR, DETROIT DISTRICT, U.S. FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION; ACCOMPANIED BY CLIFFORD G. SHANE, CHIEF INSPECTOR

Mr. BROWN. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Webber, Mr. Meserve, my name is Thomas W. Brown. I am the Director, Detroit District, U.S. Food and Drug Administration. I have with me a staff member, my chief inspector, Mr. Clifford G. Shane.

We want to thank you for this opportunity to appear before your subcommittee today. Though I have no prepared statement, I am, however, pleased to discuss Detroit district's activities and to answer any questions you may have. I would like to make a few comments.

The parent organization of the Food and Drug Administration, the Consumer Protection and Environmental Health Service, appeared before your committee on May 19. The Administrator, Mr. C. C. Johnson, made a statement which is still the policy of the Department and of the Food and Drug Administration. To my knowledge, there has been no appreciable change since that time.

I would like to point out that it seems to me that the seizures initiated by Detroit district last March of shipments of coho salmon was one of the primary precipitants of the problems of pollution that we are recognizing today. For what it is worth, I am pleased that we had an opportunity to be a part of this because I think we have to recognize that we do in fact have a problem before we can start seeking solutions.

Much has been said of the current five parts per million guideline. I would like to reemphasize that this is in fact an interim guideline that was set last April by the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. On April 21, Secretary Finch appointed a Commission on Pesticides and their relationship to environmental health. Dr. Emil Mrak is Chairman of this Commission. Its mission is to evaluate all aspects of pesticide usage and report the recommendations for research and policy guidelines. We are hopeful that the so-called Mrak committee will come forth within a few weeks, perhaps by the middle of October, with some recommendations. This may or may not have an effect on the current guideline. We just do not know.

Unless there is a policy change or unless this committee makes additional recommendations, the Food and Drug Administration will enforce the interim policy guideline of five parts per million.

I might add at this point that though I share the Senator's statement that I would like to have an opportunity to read Professor Cooper's paper in full before I comment on it, there were a few parts that I was able to extract and write down. I find it very interesting, and I think quite important, the point he made on the interaction of chemicals, pollutants, and I might add drugs, and food additives. We are not concerned only with pesticides. But I would ask what effect do the pesticides in our environment have on the drugs that we may take? Most of us at one time or another do take some drugs. Certainly, we all breathe air. We know that these contain chemicals. What are the interactions with these chemicals?

So I think that Professor Cooper's point is quite well taken that the problem of interaction should be studied.

I think also that we should be concerned, not over the acute toxicity of DDT and its analogs-what about the mutogenic effects? What about the effects of this and similar chemicals on the enzymatic system of the human body? These things must be clarified over a long period of time.

The Food and Drug Administration at Detroit approximately 2 years ago began their surveillance activities with respect to the pesticide residues in Great Lakes fishes. Currently, we are being supplied

fish from four of the Great Lakes by the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, by the State of Michigan, by the State of Ohio, and by our own district inspectors. The analytical results are in turn returned to the sources so that they know what we are finding.

In 1969, we have to date examined more fish than we did over the past 2 years. And though the data we have before us could not be considered as statistically valid to the extent that a firm conclusion could be drawn, I believe that some trends or at least some indications of the problems can be made from the data we have so far.

For example, of the four Great Lakes involved-that is, Michigan, Erie, Huron and Superior-Lake Michigan by far has the greatest percentage of fish with residues over five parts per million. Över 80 percent of the chubs from Lake Michigan that we have examined in 1969 have residues over five parts per million. It would seem that the fat content of the fish has a great bearing on the amount of pesticide residues.

The species of the fish, of course, also has a bearing. But within the same sepcies there is variation-again, I go back to the fat content-we have examined lake trout in 1969. About half of the lake trout examined had residues under five parts per million. The other half had residues over. The difference appeared to be the fat content. We had one sample, incidentally, of lake trout where the residue was over 20 parts per million. This was a fish of extremely high fat

content.

The fish that causes us the greatest concern besides the salmon and the chubs would be the lake trout. Other fish that we have examined, perch, herring, a total of around 20 other species, have not caused us any great deal of concern because the residues for the most part have been under five parts per million with a few exceptions.

In order to be responsive to the needs of the subcommittee, Mr. Chairman, I have limited my remarks in order that you may present your questions.

Senator HART. Thank you for handling it that way. I am glad that you had an opportunity to hear the testimony that went before because clearly you have reacted to some of it.

I flipped through this Washington hearing but could not find the description of your decision and action last spring in seizing the coho. Could you or Mr. Shane state for the record the sequence of events?

Mr. BROWN. Yes, sir. I believe you are correct that there is nothing in the record of the May hearing with respect to our decision to recommend seizure.

The decision came about because in the spring of 1968 the analytical results we had received at our district laboratory indicated in coho salmon a pesticide residue of DDT and its analogs of around eight parts per million. We monitored these fish through the remainder of the year. And approximately a year later-it was in Januarywe found that the pesticide residues of DDT and the analogs had risen from the eight of the previous year to between 12 and 19 parts per million. This caused us a great deal of concern, and we recommended seizure.

Now, I would point out that the tolerance for DDT in fish is zero. The law does not allow any. Administratively a guideline figure was

set at five. But we made the recommendation for seizure before the five was set.

The question may come up, Well, why would not you recommend seizure at a lower figure if the tolerance was zero? People in the administration were of the opinion that we had to prove that there was a "danger to health" involved. And from the testimony you have beard so far, I believe you can see that among the experts, there is no agreement as to danger to health. So we went on a section of the law which called these residues in fish a food additive.

Senator HART. From the spring of 1968 to the winter of 1969 you showed an increase in DDT from eight to between 12 and 19 parts per million, I think you said. Does that mean that the fish of January were older or fatter, or is it a reflection of an increase in DDT concentration in the Lake and therefore in the fish on which the coho were feeding?

Mr. BROWN. I do not believe that the latter is true that it was due to an increase in the concentration in the lake or in the fish being eaten. The levels that I spoke about were in fish in shipments that were in interstate commerce. These had gone across the State line, and thus there was Federal jurisdiction. When fish are shipped within a State or are intrastate, we have no jurisdiction, and we can take no action. So the two differences reflected shipments on which we did have jurisdiction.

I do believe that the time of year may have some bearing on the pesticide residues in fish. This is not only a personal opinion, but I understand from some of my colleagues in both State and Federal that, for instance, when the salmon spawn, when they stop feeding, they in effect live off the fat of their body. The fat dissipates, but the concentrations of DDT do not leave and will remain in the flesh. I do not know that salmon, for instance, pick up more residues because they go into the rivers.

We are in the process right now of trying to determine the pesticide residues and, again, we are speaking of DDT and its analogsof salmon from the four Great Lakes that I mentioned before by sections of the Great Lakes. We have divided the Great Lakes into a number of different sections, and we are trying to determine if one section of Lake Michigan, for example, has more fish with higher residues than another section. Maybe this will assist some way.

And, again, I want to stress that this information is passed on to other Federal agencies as well as State agencies so they may have the benefit of the work that we are doing and that a solution if there is one can be arrived at.

Senator HART. Would any coho from Lake Michigan now be below the minimum tolerance?

Mr. BROWN. Yes, sir.

Senator HART. There are some?

Mr. BROWN. Yes, sir. We are talking about coho that is caught around this time of the year. We will know more about the residue levels in October and November when these fish become available to us. The indication is that at that time of the year, the residues do increase. But at the present time, we are finding salmon with residue levels below 5.

Senator HART. Well, could the commercial fishermen, then, try to schedule his harvesting or his fishing in those months in the year when it is reasonable to expect the fish would be below the 5 parts per million tolerance.

Mr. BROWN. This is quite possible. And certainly, as a result of the work we are doing as well as other Federal agencies, this may be arrived at as a possible solution for them.

Senator HART. Do you have any idea how many months of the year that would be?

Mr. BROWN. Not being an ichthyologist, I am not a bit familiar with fish to that extent.

Senator HART. What do you say to the point Mr. Carbine made: that the commercial fisherman is being held to a marketing discipline that may seriously affect his ability to survive economically? Let us assume that, anyway. I believe it to be true. In order to protect the consumer until the final acceptable tolerance figure is established, fish cannot be marketed with DDT in excess of the 5 parts per million standard. But at the same time, you practically have to fight your way through to a boat launching ramp along the Lake because the people are going out and taking the fish themselves and then eating them.

Now, the fellow who eats his own catch and the fellow who eats the fish which he buys from the commercial fisherman is eating the same degree of danger. How do we explain that inconsistency?

Mr. BROWN. I cannot explain it either, Senator. I would say that the only relief-well, I should not say there is only one, as there are always more than two alternatives, but the relief in sight for the commercial fisherman may be a change in the guidelines or tolerance level. This would be an immediate benefit to him if this did not adversely affect the health of man.

Another alternative would be to immediately begin cleansing if this is possible Lake Michigan of pollutants, of chemical pollutants, so that even though the commercial fisherman cannot today take in a catch, in 10 years he will be able to do so.

Well, 10 years is a long time to a lot of people. But when we are talking about something of the enormity of the problem before us today, 10 years is not a long time. And it may take 50 years to clean up Lake Michigan. It may take longer than that. No one knows.

So either a change of tolerance or clean up the Great Lake. There is one other alternative that comes to mind. Some of this fish can go into a whole fish protein concentrate which in effect takes out fat and removes chemicals so you have a high protein food remaining. It has been done with ocean fish, hake and hake-like fish. This could be done with Great Lakes fish.

Senator HART. What do we do with the oil we have set aside that has all the

Mr. BROWN. Maybe we can use it as a fuel or something. I do not know.

Senator HART. Mr. Meserve.

Mr. MESERVE. To clarify for the record-when you sample a ship ment of fish for pesticide residues, if it is a can of salmon, for example, do you open that can and sample it, or do you also sample the fish as it comes out of the lake?