PACIFIC ISLANDS REPORT

Pacific Islands Development Program/East-West Center
With Support From Center for Pacific Islands Studies/University of Hawai‘i

MELBOURNE, Australia (Radio Australia, Dec. 4) – Residents of the Marshall Islands are unhappy that a United States-funded health program in regions affected by US-nuclear testing will close at the end of this month.

Funding for the "177 Health Plan," named after the section of the Compact of Free Association between the United States and Marshall Islands that funded it, will end on December 31.

The program, funded by an annual $2 million grant, provides health care services to up to 16,000 islanders - a quarter of the population.

The islanders are from the former nuclear test atolls of Bikini, Enewetak, Rongelap and Utrik.

Rongelap Senator Abacca Anjain-Maddison says efforts will continue to lobby the U.S. Congress to extend additional funding to the four-atoll health program.

America carried out 67 nuclear tests at Bikini and Enewetak from 1946 to1958, with nuclear fallout dusting atolls in the area.

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