Chornobyl's impact on health, the environment and the economy (05/12/96)

Chornobyl's impact on health, the environment and the economy

by David R. Marples

The following was delivered as the 31st annual Shevchenko Lecture on April 2, at the University of Alberta. David R. Marples is professor of history and director of the Stasiuk Program on Contemporary Ukraine (CIUS), University of Alberta, Canada. The Shevchenko Lecture was organized by the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies and sponsored by the Ukrainian Professional and Business Club of Edmonton.

CONCLUSION

Thyroid gland cancer

Thyroid gland cancer had begun to develop at a rapid rate among children by 1990. Prior to Chornobyl, this was a rare disease among children. The number of cases annually in both Ukraine and Belarus was one to three per year. The sudden and dramatic rise that has occurred was predicted by no one - this has been a feature of the Chornobyl disaster: it brought about the unexpected, whereas anticipated problems, such as leukemia, appear to have longer periods of induction, in contrast to the only really comparable instances of nuclear fallout, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Moreover, the rise in incidence of this disease has occurred precisely in the most contaminated areas. In the north-central areas of Ukraine, for example, the rate of incidence in children has risen by 700 to 900 percent. Such zones of Ukraine and especially Belarus, its northern neighbor, are seeing about 100 new cases of thyroid cancer each year, with no sign of a slowdown.

This disease is a highly aggressive one, which can metastasize rapidly to other parts of the body if not operated on promptly. In about 40 percent of cases, repeat surgery is necessary. Virtually all cases involve children born or conceived prior to the Chornobyl accident, and the majority are children who were under age 5 in April 1986. Thus, today an older group of children is the most affected, especially those in the 10-15 age range. Initially, the cause of their illness was thought to be radioactive cesium, but last November in Geneva at the World Health Organization (WHO) conference, scientists acknowledged what specialists in Ukraine and Belarus had long claimed: i.e., that the cause was Chornobyl-generated radioactive iodine.

The area around Chornobyl has an iodine-deficient soil, and thyroid-related diseases have long been common. Thus after the accident, children's thyroids were especially susceptible to radioactive iodine in the atmosphere.

Today over 1,000 children have contracted thyroid gland cancer (thyroid cancer) in the contaminated zones of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. The numbers have also risen appreciably among adults. Among children, the forecast by one WHO expert is that their total numbers could ultimately reach 10,000, or 1 in every 10 children living in the contaminated zones. This means that these children will have to be monitored for the rest of their lives.

Though the survival rate from thyroid cancer is quite high at 90 percent, this would still mean that eventually 1,000 deaths could be anticipated. As we will discuss in a moment, moreover, the conditions of the laboratories, clinics, and hospitals in which sick children are being treated are deplorable by Western standards.

There is also a general consensus that thyroid cancer cannot appear alone, and that other types of cancer will follow. The incidence of leukemia to date is well within the general European range, though the numbers have risen since the accident. Bone cancer - which might be anticipated because of the fallout of strontium - has risen notably in contaminated zones. The least that can be said in this medical sphere is that the future will see an appreciable rise in the incidence of various types of cancers, and not merely those of the thyroid gland.

Other diseases

The Chornobyl disaster has been linked to a general rise in morbidity that has acquired alarming proportions in the zones of significant radioactive fallout. There is no consensus, however, between the rise in oncological diseases and enhanced irradiation of the population. These include a remarkable increase, for example, in early childhood diabetes, anemia and illnesses associated with general fatigue. Local doctors attribute such developments to a sort of Chornobyl AIDS - a weakening of the body's resistance to various diseases. Some Western specialists maintain, conversely, that the phenomenon is related to increased anxiety and tension.

One also has to take into account the demographic and general health situation in the country. In Ukraine, infant mortality has continued to rise - it is currently around 15 per 1,000 births - while life expectancy has declined, especially among men. The death rate exceeds the birth rate at 13.4 per 1,000 population (the world average is 9.2). Ukraine has seen also a significant increase in infectious diseases - especially tuberculosis, cholera, and diphtheria - which can be associated partly with industrial pollution, partly with the drop in the living standards of the population, and partly with poor nutrition and unhealthy lifestyles. Only the latter could be linked to Chornobyl, as it has occurred mainly through the fear of eating contaminated food.

That there is a health crisis in Ukraine today is not in doubt. Its root causes, however, are uncertain.

It is inaccurate to say, as some scientists have done, that none of the diseases cited are relatsed to Chornobyl. The most that can be said is that the precise link is unknown. If Chornobyl has proved anything it is the unpredictability of the medical results of radioactive fallout.

Further, independent Ukraine is in no position to deal with Chornobyl unassisted. In 1992, for example, the country could afford to devote 15.7 percent of the state budget to Chornobyl-related questions; in 1993, the percentage dropped to 7.3 and in 1995, the figure was 3.4 percent or about $430 million (U.S.). The annual costs, however, have not decreased.

The Chornobyl nuclear power station

Ukraine inherited the problem of the Chornobyl nuclear accident from the former Soviet Union, but has been forced to carry this burden at a time of great financial strain. Much of today's expenditure pertains also to the station itself.

Various questions related to the Chornobyl nuclear plant continue to occupy international attention. In December 1995, under some duress, Ukraine signed an agreement with the G-7 countries in Ottawa to shut down the station by the year 2000.

Simultaneously, an intensive propaganda campaign was initiated within Ukraine to keep the plant in operation well beyond that date, inspired by its past and present directors, Mykhailo Umanets and Serhiy Parashyn. The latter has declared it one of the safest plants in the former USSR because of improvements made since 1986.

That Ukraine should plead for the continuance of the Chornobyl station is one of the great paradoxes of modern history. In 1988-1990 there was a massive campaign to stop the further operation of the plant led by the ecological association Green World and later by the Green Party, which resulted in a 1990 moratorium on the commissioning or construction of any new nuclear reactors.

Today Ukraine maintains that it requires $4.4 billion to close the plant and to build a new energy station in the vicinity, preferably close to the newly built town of Salvutych, 45 miles northeast of Chornobyl, constructed after the accident to replace Prypriat and which contains 28,000 plant employees and their families today.

Economic factors led to lifting of the moratorium in 1993. Nuclear power remains a fundamental part of Ukraine's domestic energy production, accounting in the winter of 1995 for as much as 45 percent of all energy produced. In addition, nuclear power has enabled Ukraine to at least keep some options open in its dealings with Russia, because the latter country has used energy exports as a political weapon against Ukraine on several occasions.

However, the situation in the Ukrainian nuclear power industry appears ominous. The nuclear industry has seen over 8,000 specialists leave for Russia since 1992, where wages and pensions are higher. Safety regulators work for little and frequently for no wages. Ukraine's other stations, VVERs (water/water-pressurized reactors), are unreliable. Accidents are frequent, especially at the giant Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, which has 6 VVER reactors, each of 1,000 megawatts (MW) capacity. Three accidents occurred in the space of four months last year, one of which was potentially very serious. The Chornobyl-1 reactor had a radiation leakage last November which ranked 3 on the international scale. Several of Ukraine's reactors, including Chornobyl and Rivne-1, are considered obsolete and dangerous by the IAEA and other bodies.

Finally what of the destroyed fourth reactor at Chornobyl? About 200 tons of nuclear fuel are contained within the unit, about 10 tons of which are in the form of dust that could be released into the atmosphere in the event of an accident. About 700 people work currently at this unit, and Ukraine spends several million dollars annually on monitoring the reactor.

The sarcophagus constructed over the destroyed reactor in 1986 is collapsing. At most, it can only last for a further 10 to 15 years, according to official estimates. In 1992-1993 an international discussion took place to devise a plan to cover the reactor with a second cover or sarcophagus. Almost 400 plans were submitted, and an international consortium called Alliance has produced a workable scheme. However, estimates of the cost of a new cover average around $300 million (U.S.) for a five-year project, in addition to $2.5 billion over a 15-year period to render safe the destroyed fourth unit. Such costs have not to date been included in G-7 discussions or in loans and subsidies provided to Ukraine to stop operations at the first and third Chornobyl reactors.

From all perspectives, Ukraine is in a perilous situation. Chornobyl has resulted in costs that would be beyond any government's ability to cover. The health consequences are mounting and are more evident today than ever before. At the same time Ukraine, as a newly independent state, recently accepted as a member of the Council of Europe, is a country trying desperately to stay aloof from the sort of military-security alliance being formed today by Russia and others of its neighbors. This is the perspective in which Chornobyl has to be examined.

The 10th anniversary marks an epoch, perhaps, but to perceive 1996 as marking an end to Chornobyl problems is as mythical as to define radiation fallout according to a 30-kilometer zone, or to say that because not every illness can be linked clearly to radiation, then no such link exists. Chornobyl is the worst industrial accident in history. It contributed to Ukraine's independence by fueling popular discontent with Moscow-based management. Now it threatens through its energy and health consequences to limit that same independence.

The word "crisis" is overused historically. In the case of Chornobyl, however, it is the only appropriate word.

PART I

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