Tobacco Documents Online

M E M 01 R A N D II M DATE: MARCH 18, 1994 RE: SUHMARY OF INFORMATION ON KENNETH G. BROWN, Ph.D. A review of material available in-house on Kenneth G. Brown, the statistician who, as a subcontractor to the EPA, was the primary author of the EPA's Risk Assessment on ETS reveals that he has a Ph.D. in statistics and has worked with researchers from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and as a contractor to the EPA. Brown has been a private consultant since approximately 1987. With the exception of the Risk Assessment and the summary of the EPA's public docket (attached), he has apparently done no other work on ETS issues. Biographical Information Biographical information regarding Dr. Kenneth G. Brown is scant. He received his B.A. degree in 1962 from Duke University, his M.A. from American University in 1969 and earned a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins in 1972. From 1972-1978 there is no information available. In 1978-1985, he is listed as an Associate Professor in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Maine. It appears that in the year 1985, he worked at NIEHS and in 1989 formed his own consulting firm in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He has published a few articles. At the December 1990 IAQTHEC meeting for review of the first draft of the EPA Risk Assessment, Brown said, when introducing himself, that he had been an independent consultant "for the last three years." Brown's publications give what appears to be a home address in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, with the exception of one 1986 paper that indicates that Brown was "formerly" at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). Brown collaborated with personnel from NIEHS on several papers (1985-1989)~. Brown does business as Kenneth G. Brown, Ph.D., Incorporated, at P.O. Box 16608, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 27516-6608. His letterhead suggests that his specialties aren "research statistics" and "health effects assessment." C N Cc ~ N ~ N 10863996 CJ1 W

MEMORANDUM RE: KENNETH G. BROWN, PH.D. MARCH 18, 1994 PAGE 2 Research and Publications In general, the articles by Brown deal with models and other methods of estimating risks due to exposures ranging from chemicals to radiation. His only ETS-related publication, a 1991 meeting abstract, appears to be closely related to his work on the EPA risk assessment. Brown has no other ETS- or smoking-related publications. Brown's work on the EPA Risk Assessment on ETS was not his first contract with EPA: a 1989 paper, "Statistical Uncertainty in the No-Observed-Adverse-Effect Level," authored with L. Erdreich of Clement Associates, Edison, New Jersey, was supported by an EPA contract. In its references, that paper lists additional contract work by Brown and others for EPA's Statistical Policy Branch. The first project concerning ETS prepared by Brown for the EPA appears to be a draft final report on "Environmental Tobacco Smoke and Lung Cancer," submitted in September 1989. Brown was the "task leader" for this project, prepared under contract to the Arlington, Virginia office of the Battelle Memorial Institute. Brown is listed as author of the majority of the 1990 draft of the EPA Risk Assessment on ETS. Correspondence between Brown and EPA's Steven Bayard indicates that Brown apparently ran into some difficulties with revising the draft Risk Assessment as scheduled. In a December 17, 1990 letter to Bayard, he states that he is "unable to respond to the work assgnment from EPA on the ETS project as it currently stands." Brown indicated that he had used local faculty and graduate students as part-time help on the Risk Assessment project, and was unable to do so at that time. In an April 9, 1991 letter to Bayard, Brown commented that "[t)his kind of work is more difficult and time-consuming than I had envisioned," but promised to meet the budget and time specifications given. He stated that his effort in revising the epidemiological portion of the Risk Assessment was "justified," because the "studies are the primary source of information to address the SAB and public comments, which probe more deeply than we had previously investigated." In an attachment to this letter, Brown indicates that he had "logged" $34,410 personally, and $58,225 total to his firm on this project (October 1990-March 1991). Brown prepared much of the revised Risk Assessment as a subcontractor to ICF Incorporated, Fairfax, Virginia. Lexis/Nexis searches did not reveal much about Brown's opinion concerning the 10863996 IQ 0 N W ~ ~ 1~

MEMORANDUM RE: KENNETH G. BROWN, PH.D. MARCH 18, 1994 PAGE 3 final Risk Assessment, except for a quote attributed to him, concerning the addition of other studies (e.g., Brownson and Stockwell) to the meta-analysis. Brown "said that adding another study or two to the analysis 'will not change our conclusion that environmental tobacco smoke is a carcinogen,'" in a January 8, 1993 Newsdav article following the release of the final Risk Assessment. Brown collaborated with Douglas G. Crawford-Brown, a radiation physicist with the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill on material concerning ETS and radon. This material appears to have been intended for inclusion in the EPA Risk Assessment on ETS, but was not included.