Radiological protection philosophy for the 21st century.

The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) has stated that its recommendations will be reviewed at least every 10-15 years. It is now some 13 years since the main commission released, for comment, a draft of what was to become the 1990 Recommendations of the ICRP. These have become the basis for international basic safety standards and have been adopted in almost all countries that have radiological protection legislation. Therefore, the ICRP has been stimulating discussion, during the last three years, on the best way of expressing protection philosophy for the next publication of its recommendations, which it hopes will be by 2005. It is now beginning to prepare a draft of these recommendations, with a view to distributing an early version for comment, even though the background work is incomplete.