Health Care and Especially the Legacy of the Chornobyl Disaster Go to the A Belarus Miscellany Topic List Search the A Belarus Miscellany Web site

Non-Chornobyl-Related Health Issues

• Some information about HIV Infections and AIDS in Belarus.     This is a new topic area for this Web site.

• Some information about Venereal Disease and Related Health Matters in Belarus.

• Some information about Other Health Matters in Belarus.

• Some information about other health-care related organizations.

Chornobyl-Related Health Issues

Go to the following Background Summary or skip it and go directly to:
• A list of links to other Web sites and other sources of information (articles, books, etc.).

• The list of Chornobyl-Related Healthcare and Relief Organizations on this Web page.

• Links to Section about Recent News Stories   about Chornobyl and Belarus

• The Events Calendar on this A Belarus Miscellany Web site for (possible) information concerning upcoming conferences and events related to the Chornobyl disaster and its aftermath.

Belarus has the horrible distinction of being the country most affected by the worst peace time nuclear accident in history. The following lists summarize some of the repercussions of the nuclear power plant disaster at Chornobyl, Ukraine, on April 26-28, 1986. Needless to say, not everyone agrees to the figures cited in the following; nonetheless, they give a general idea of the scope of the disaster:

• The amount of contamination has been compared to from 200 to 230 times that emitted by the bombs exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945.
• Over seventy percent of the fallout fell on Belarus.
• Over twenty percent of Belarus land (2300 square miles, one-half of which is agricultural) is seriously contaminated.
• One-half million people had to be relocated.
• Millions have been seriously exposed to radiation (approximately one-fifth of the population).
• The occurrence of thyroid cancer in children has increased 100-fold in Belarus, 30-fold in Ukraine, and so far, leukemia has doubled.
  • The number of thyroid cancer cases increases by 130-140 every year in Belarus.     source: the BelaPAN News Service, December, 11, 1997.
• The genetic future of the Belarusian people is questionable as well, as a result of the damage. See Nature magazine (UK), April, 1996, for results of a recent study.
• Gennady Antsipov, chief of the Department for Rehabilitation of Contaminated Areas of the Belarusian Ministry of Emergency Situations, stated that radioactively contaminated houses and buildings had been demolished and dumped only in 170 of the 496 villages from which all inhabitants had been evacuated.     Source: BelaPAN, No. 27; Tuesday, April 7, 1998; 7:40 p.m.
• Social and psychological affects of the disaster are only beginning to be considered. Some speculate these areas bear the majority of the costs of the disaster.
• Approximately ten to twenty percent of the national budget relates to dealing with the effects of Chornobyl; an extreme burden for Belarus, and a huge distraction from other matters in an emerging nation.

An incredible amount of the human and economic resources of Belarus will have to deal with the effects of this disaster for many, many years to come.

Links to Section about Recent news stories

• For an additional list of organizations helping people in Belarus, in particular helping victims of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster,
  • Refer this section of the Virtual Guide to Belarus: Belarusian Chernobyl Tragedy   This Site includes a list of Chornobyl-Related International Charity Organizations

  • Also see Chernobyl.info (hosted by Swiss; in German, English, & Russian. Mirror sites in Belarus [www.belarus.chernobyl.info] and Ukraine [www.ukraine.chernobyl.info].)

  • Also see Chernobyl related links to more information available on the Internet (a collection of pointers from a Web site in Sweden)

  • Also see Chernobyl.com   FYI: Good historical summary, but doesn't appear to be kept up to date (April, 1999).

  • Also see The Chernobyl Disaster   FYI: At the "Manitoba Parents for Ukrainian Education" Web site (April, 1999).

  • Also see Information on Chornobyl (Chernobyl) and the Surrounding Area (a collection of pointers at the Univ. of Michigan, USA)   FYI: Appears to no longer be on the WWW (April, 1999).

  • Also see section, Environmental Organizations and Issues, at this Web site.

• Also see the book section of this Web site for information about the books, Children of Chernobyl: Raising Hope from the Ashes and Trace of the Black Wind.

• Also see article, Children of Chernobyl, at the Index on Censorship Web site.
  The article includes ". . .excerpts and illustrations from the Footprint [Trace] of the Black Wind (Mensk 1995), [that] were produced by Belarusian school children in response to a competition on the theme 'Chernobyl in my destiny.' The writing by children from within or near the 30 kilometre exclusion zone expresses their confusion, grief and sense of loss at their evacuation from their homes. Children from further afield, in areas officially declared safe, discovered only three years later the true extent of the disaster and the damage to their lives."

• Also see article, U.S. Congress Hearing on the Legacy of Chornobyl   at the U.S. Congress Web site
  "U.S. Congress Hearing on the Legacy of Chornobyl--1986 to 1996 and Beyond, the official transcript of the public hearing before the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (Helsinki Commission) is now located on the Publications Section of the Commission's homepage. . . . (Testifying at this 10th anniversary hearing were Ukrainian Ambassador Yuri Shcherbak, Belarusian Ambassador Martynov; Georgetown professor Murray Feshbach; Alex Kuzma of Children of Chornobyl)"

• Also see article, Chernobyl Linked to Leukemia in U.S. Children   at Yahoo World News Web site, April 18, 1997, but no longer available on the Web, April, 1999

  "NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Fallout from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster may be responsible for a 30% increase in leukemia rates among American children born during that time period, according to New York radiation experts."

  "In the months after the accident at Chernobyl, nuclear fallout was detected in the milk supply in the United States and remained at high levels until mid-1988, the researchers wrote in Saturday's issue of The Lancet. . . ."