The Plutonium Files
America's Secret Medical Experiments in the Cold War
by Eileen Welsome

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The Plutonium Files is the shocking exposé of the US government’s medical experiments on unwitting citizens during the Cold War. Americans recoiled when they learned of the brutal experiments conducted by Nazi doctors. But as the world was learning about those horrors, US scientists were injecting eighteen patients in hospital wards with plutonium, a deadly substance used to make the atomic bomb. The patients were given code numbers and went to their graves without knowing what had been done to them. In The Plutonium Files, Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Eileen Welsome describes how she uncovered the identities of these patients and goes on to chronicle the web of deceit that enabled the experiment to remain largely unknown for fifty years. It’s a searing, cautionary tale about what can happen behind the cloak of secrecy In this new edition, the book returns to the July 16, 1945, Trinity Test in southern New Mexico. Trinity was not only the world’s first atomic bomb, but the world’s first dirty bomb. Survivors and their descendants in the path of the fallout experienced a huge increase in radiation-linked cancers and are still fighting for reparations. The Plutonium Files also traces the murky origins of other radiation experiments. Like the plutonium injectees, the subjects were surreptitiously followed for years. They included children in Massachusetts, pregnant women in Tennessee, and prisoners in Oregon and Washington. “A fierce expose of governmental duplicity and dangerous science …The literature on the official crimes of the Cold War is large and growing. Welsome’s stunning book adds much to that literature, and it makes for sobering reading.” Kirkus Reviews

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Winner: * PEN Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction * PEN USA West Literary Award for Research Nonfiction What the Critics Said: “A disturbing look at what happens when scientists lose touch with their humanity in the single-minded pursuit of scientific advancement …the power of this book …derives from [Welsome’s] relentless pursuit of the names, forms, and personal histories of the victims of nuclear science.” —The Washington Post Book World “An expansive and valuable account …engrossing.” —The New York Times Book Review “There should have been – and should now be – hundreds of other reporters out there doing what [Welsome] has so brilliantly done here.” —Newsday “Compelling…[Welsome’s] portraits of leading officials are vivid and subtle, wonderfully capturing [their] deep moral ambivalence.” —Los Angeles Times A fierce expose of governmental duplicity and dangerous science …The literature on the official crimes of the Cold War is large and growing. Welsome’s stunning book adds much to that literature, and it makes for sobering reading.” —Kirkus Reviews "... Welsome’s tenacious and resourceful detective work has unveiled the saga of a sordid, tragic, yet fascinating chapter in the history of American medical science..." —The New England Journal of Medicine

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Eileen Welsome is an investigative reporter and author who has received many awards for her work, including the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. She is also author of The General and the Jaguar: Pershing’s Hunt for Pancho Villa, and Cold War Secrets: A Vanished Professor, a Suspected Killer, and Hoover’s FBI. She received a journalism degree from the University of Texas and a master’s degree in oral history in from Columbia University. She currently lives in Denver, Colorado.

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Contributors

Author

Eileen Welsome

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