Senator RIBICOFF. Once you get this information, couldn't you come up with some recommended licensing requirements you could recommend to the States for adoption?

Dr. JOLIET. Yes, for those conditions we tested for, sir. But there were other conditions for which we were not able to test. There are conditions that were not susceptible of rapid diagnosis. These were screening tests that could be performed. Even then, as I recall it, the battery of tests given there took something between 40 minutes and an hour. There are other conditions for which we have not tested.

BUDGET REQUEST FOR SIMULATION OF ACCIDENTS

Senator RIBICOFF. How much are you requesting for simulation work in this year's budget?

Dr. JOLIET. We requested about $300,000.

Senator RIBICOFF. And yet you say you could use a million?
Mr. POND. I think he said $500,000.

Senator RIBICOFF. $500,000 to a million, if my memory serves me correctly.

Dr. JOLIET. Our requirements are submitted in conjunction with other needs within the Division. And total budgetary requirements dictate a reasonable approach.

You recall that I said how much we could use. This was related to the availability of people. We would not be able to start as of this moment on an expanded budget until we were able to employ the required people, sir.

Senator RIBICOFF. But when you consider, as I think the Secretary testified, that the traffic problem is the fourth largest cause of deaths in this country, and when you consider how much you spend for the other three causes of death, or other illnesses, you realize how insignificant the sum is.

What do you think is the total sum of all moneys spent in the Federal Government for safety work, generally?

Dr. JOLIET. The Highway Research Board conducted a rapid survey. They don't claim any particular accuracy for it, and I quote them with trepidation. I have not their permission to do so. They came up with the figure of something like $8 million, sir.

EXHIBIT 19

FEDERAL HIGHWAY SAFETY PROGRAMS EXPENDITURES, 1964-66

EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT,

BUREAU OF THE BUDGET, Washington, D.C., April 20, 1965.

DEAR SENATOR RIBICOFF: In response to the request of Mr. Sonosky of the subcommittee's staff, there is enclosed a table setting forth Federal expenditures for highway safety in fiscal years 1964, 1965, and 1966.

As agreed to by Mr. Sonosky, the estimate is limited to Federal highway safety programs whose primary objective is to improve highway safety for the American public. Not included are programs designed principally to improve the highway accident record of Federal employees and members of the armed services.

Sincerely,

WILLIAM D. CAREY, Executive Assistant Director.

Department of Health, Education, and Welfare... 2,403

Department of Labor.

5

5

5

Other Federal expenditures have an impact on highway safety. Notable are Federal expenditures for highway construction. Of particular relevance is the Federal Spot Improvement Program which gives priority to improving sectors of highway with high accident frequency. Federal authorizations for this program are estimated at $2,200 in 1964, $25,000 in 1965, and $50,000 in 1966, which are matched with approximately equal amounts of State funds.

*Includes approximately 25% matching funds from States.

CENTRALIZATION OF RESPONSIBILITY IN ONE FEDERAL DEPARTMENT

Senator RIBICOFF. Nobody knows-in other words, everybody has a little piece of something. Do you think the problem of traffic safety in all its phases should be centralized in one department or one agency instead of being scattered through 16 different agencies of the Government?

Dr. JOLIET. We have one person who has worked 3 months of a 6month period getting the data that you are requesting. It will take another 3 months to get it. The answer to the question is, "No, sir; I do not."

Senator RIBICOFF. Then you don't know what we are getting for this information that is going to take you 6 months to collect. What bothers me, from an organization standpoint, is the fact that we have programs scattered throughout the Government, and nobody knows what is going on. It will take 6 months for anybody to find out just what is being done with how much money by whom. How effective can such work be, or how effective can such results be?

Secretary CELEBREZZE. I think that you have to break it down into two categories. Each department has its own programs for its own drivers. In other words, if we have an accident we determine why we had the accident and try to take corrective action. I think it is a responsibility that must stay with each department, with the Post Office Department, the Interior Department, and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In other words, analyze the number and nature of accidents that your employees are having per year in driving motor vehicles.

Secondly, we have research under the Public Health Service, and many outside organizations, and we do have a coordinating effort For example, we have national conferences on medical aspects of driver safety. That involves participating Federal agencies. Interstate Commerce Commission, the Bureau of Public Roads, the Federal Aviation Agency, the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Navy, the Veterans' Administration, the National Safety Council, the American National Red Cross, the President's Committee for Traffic Safety, and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, in which we make our views known, and tell of our experiences.

PHS CONCERNED WITH HUMAN BEHAVIOR

The Public Health Service is concerned with human behavior, because of the medical aspects involved. I don't think that you can just package traffic safety and say from here everything is going to stem. It just does not work that way. As I see it, the primary objective of the Public Health Service in traffic safety, the phase that we emphasize, is human behavior. We make grants and conduct our own research on human behavior and then make that knowledge available to the general public.

REPORTS FROM RESEARCH GRANTEES TO PHS AND THE AUTOMOBILE

INDUSTRY

Senator RIBICOFF. If you take the work of Cornell, my understanding is that when they do this work the raw data and information never comes to HEW.

Secretary CELEBREZZE. Mr. Pond is very familiar with that. I asked him this morning when we were coming here if he would address himself to that particular point, and he said he would.

Mr. POND. Basically a research grantee is required, to report annually. We have reports which contain the results of the research that they have done to date. At the end of a grant, whenever it is terminated, and Cornell is continuing the research, there is a terminal report. At that time the investigator who had the grant, as he may have been doing already, is expected to publish his findings. If he does not publish his findings within 6 months, the Government has the right to and does publish these findings. Our experience has been— we are research grantees and we are familiar with this-that they do publish regularly and as completely as they can, based on the scientific evaluation of the results they get. There have been many publications that have come out of the ACIR project. We do not think from a scientific standpoint that preliminary findings should be published, because they may very well be misleading.

Senator RIBICOFF. But this information is given to the automobile industry?

Mr. POND. It is given to us as well as the automobile industry. We get it as well as the automobile industry.

Senator RIBICOFF. Does all the raw information that goes to the automobile industry also come to you?

Mr. POND. The only information that does not come are single case reports which go to the automotive industry. These would be of no particular

Senator RIBICOFF. What does the automobile industry do with it? Mr. POND. Doctor Joliet?

Dr. JOLIET. The automobile industry pays over and above this grant they give to ACIR to get individual case reports that are directed toward the individual manufacturer. Now, this may provide them information, and would be available to us too if we chose to purchase it. or if we chose to ask them to make it available to us.

Senator RIBICOFF. If they make it available to the automobile industry which gives one-third of the money, why shouldn't they make it available to you, who give them two-thirds of the money? Maybe the automobile manufacturer could find out something that might be detrimental, and they might change it in their car if you were dealing with a basic mechanical defect, or they might not. But yet, if it came to your Department and you found that there was a basic defect, then you would have a public obligation to disclose this information to the public. This is what bothers me, that the sepcialized knowledge and details are given to the automobile industry, but are not given to the Government. Yet the Government does have a responsibility for the protection of the lives of the people of this country.

Dr. JOLIET. If I could express myself properly, I believe I could relieve anyone's anxiety about it. We could, in answer to the question. get any specific information that we wanted on a case basis. To us, though, we are trying to compare one thing with another, for example. one kind of glass with another kind of glass, one kind of door opener to another kind of door opener. Events of one case do not help us get this information. Events of one might give the automobile manufacturer a cue, and he could take this cue and retest it. And they do

that, the Automobile Manufacturers Association and the individual manufacturers, given a cue, maybe to pursue it independently by reason of supplemental research.

Senator RIBICOFF. They could, but it does not necessarily mean that they do.

Dr. JOLIET. I don't know that; no, sir.

Senator RIBICOFF. But if you had the information, you then could pursue it and make it available. Now, it could very well be that there are certain defects in automobiles which are sold by the hundreds of thousands about which people should have knowledge and which should be made available, but are not made available. Automobile manufacturers get the information and you don't get the information, but it is not made available. I am at a loss to understand this failure of governmental responsibility, especially when you are making the money available to the research organization.

Dr. JOLIET. Well, it is a matter of statistics, I guess. I don't know that I can explain it adequately.

For example, supposing we were concerned with a new type steering wheel on a car. The information from Cornell would have to provide data comparing the performance of this steering wheel with all other steering wheels in the accident situation. The accidents would have to be matched before we would be able to say that this steering wheel is safer or less safe-by the way, there are other ways that we could get at this information if we were able to do it--but through this research grant, we have to compare numbers of cases with one device with numbers of cases without that device. Then, we begin to arrive at the truth. There is very little in medicine

Senator RIBICOFF. You have picked an item that is one of the greatest causes of injury, the question of the steering wheel.

Dr. JOLIET. Yes, sir.

Senator RIBICOFF. You might discover that a certain type of steering wheel is very bad; whether it is relatively bad compared to other steering wheels isn't the point. You might have a steering wheel that is very harmful, and you may be able to find this out with one or two steering wheels. Something ought to be done about it, it is easy to understand, if you have a bad steering wheel that causes an unusual type of injury when a person is in an accident.

Dr. JOLIET. We have another means of control. Not only myself but also Doctor Goldstein are in contact with Cornell and with the other grantees, We hold frequent conferences with them. We are acquainted with the work they are doing directly. We believe that if the kind of events you infer were to happen, we would know about them.

Senator RIBICOFF. What would you do then? Have you ever made known to the public a basic defect that you have found in an automobile?

Dr. JOLIET. We have not found basic defects in automobiles at a time when we could tell the public anything about them. Through this grant, as you have pointed out, the information forthcoming is after the end of that model year. Telling people they should not drive car X that was built 2 or 3 years ago isn't going to do very much good. What we are after is the design features that made car X unsafe.