Chernobyl+Q3

Question 3: Describe the impact the disaster had on the environment and people? After the Chernobyl disaster 237 people suffered from acute radiation sickness, within 3 months, 31 people died. Most of these people were fire and rescue workers trying to bring the accident under control, who weren’t fully aware of how dangerous exposure to radiation smoke was. Civilians of Pripyat were exposed to radiation both directly from the radioactive clouds and the radioactive materials disposed on the ground and through consuming food or air. Doses of radiation received during and immediately after the accident were high for some emergency workers and people living in contaminated areas. Because of contaminated milk, thyroids of many children were heavily exposed to radioactive iodine. Right now, more than 100 000 people are living in contaminated areas still receive a higher dose of radiation than the limit recommended for the general public. Confusion has circulated about the impact of the accident has given rise to highly exaggerated claims that tens or even hundreds of thousands of people have died as a result of the accident. A much smaller death toll can be directly attributed to Chernobyl radiation. 28 emergency workers died from acute radiation syndrome, 15 patients died from thyroid cancer and it’s roughly estimated that the total number of deaths from cancer caused by the Chernobyl disaster may reach 4000 among the 600 000 people having received the greater and most threatening exposures in the general population of the contaminated increased the number of cases of leukaemia or solid cancers, except all childhood thyroid cancer. Thousands of those who were children and adolescents at the time of the accident have developed thyroid cancer as a result of exposure to radioactive iodine the majority of those cancers have been successfully treated. Some areas of Europe were significantly contaminated particularly in current Belarus, Russia and the Ukraine by large quantities of radioactive materials released from the damaged reactor. Most of these materials have since transformed into stable, non-radioactive materials but some will remain radioactive for a long time. The urban areas near the reactor were heavily contaminated and rapidly evacuated. Now and for decades to come, contamination with longer-lived radioactive caesium is the main concern in some rural areas. By: Pamella Xanthakis 8A