1.5 Million Living in Contaminated Areas ........................................
themoscowtimes.com
By Oksana Yablokova
Staff Writer
Sergei Karpukhin
More than 1.5 million Russians live in areas contaminated with radiation from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, the country's chief health official said Monday.
Speaking at a news conference two days before the 20th anniversary of the disaster, Gennady Onishchenko, head of the Federal Consumer Protection Service, said many in these areas ate local meat, dairy products and fruit and vegetables, despite doctors' warnings.
In Bryansk, the most country's most contaminated region, health official have recorded 122 cases in the past 20 years of thyroid cancer among children.
All those cases are considered directly related to Chernobyl. The number is likely to grow if those residing in affected areas continue to ignore health warnings, Onishchenko told reporters.
"Our main health concern is that many people seem to ignore, to put it mildly, our recommendations not to ... consume produce that they grow without taking proper precautions," Onishchenko said.
"The primary source of the radiation that gets into our bodies is the food we consume," he continued. "The main way to prevent new cases of cancer is to minimize the main factor, which is consuming contaminated food."
Tests confirm dangerous radiation levels in about 13 percent of the meat, dairy goods and fruits and vegetables from private gardens and farms in the western parts of the Bryansk and Kaluga regions, Onishchenko said.
Russian officials say that 14 regions encompassing 4,343 towns and villages were affected by Chernobyl.
Vladimir Demidov of the Health Ministry said Monday that 8,000 had died and 60,000 had been declared disabled as a result of the disaster, The Associated Press reported.
Bryansk, 380 kilometers southwest of Moscow, also includes its own isolation zone, which includes four villages that were evacuated immediately after the disaster and remain deserted to this day.
Many people living in the region have the right to be resettled elsewhere at government expense, if they want to do so, Onishchenko said.
About 180,000 Chernobyl cleanup workers live in Russia, the most of any country.
A total of 300,000 helped clean up the reactor. |
