Epidemiologic studies based on the Chernobyl accident
- National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD (United States)
There are great opportunities in the post-Chernobyl experience for significant epidemiologic research, perhaps even more in the area of disaster research than in the area of the human health effects of ionizing radiation. But the potential opportunity for learning the effects of radioiodine on the thyroid is very great and has aroused widespread national and international investigative interest. The opportunities for significant epidemiologic research are, however, severely limited currently by the worsening economic situation in Belarus and Ukraine, where the greatest exposure occurred, and by the lack of personnel trained in appropriate methods of study, the lack of modern equipment, the lack of supplies, the poor communication facilities, and the difficulties of accurate dose estimation. the disadvantages may or may not outweigh the obvious advantages of large numbers, the extensive direct thyroidal measurements made shortly after the accident in 1986, the magnitude of the releases of radioiodine, and the retention of the former Soviet system of universal medical care. Both the European Commission (EC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) have been working actively to strengthen the infrastructure of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. New scientific knowledge has yet to emerge from the extensive epidemiologic work but information of considerable public health significance has begun to accumulate. The bulk of the thyroid cancer has been shown to be valid by international pathology review; both EC and WHO representatives have declared the increase in thyroid cancer among children to have been caused in large part by Chernobyl. No increase in leukemia has been seen in the general population. The WHO pilot studies have shown no evidence of an increase in psychologic or neurologic complications among those exposed in utero. Ongoing epidemiologic work can be described by review of the inventory that the WHO has begun to maintain and publish. 20 refs., 7 tabs.
- OSTI ID:
- 518635
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-950408-; TRN: 97:014669
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 31. annual meeting of the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP), Arlington, VA (United States), 12-13 Apr 1995; Other Information: PBD: 1996; Related Information: Is Part Of Environmental dose reconstruction and risk implications; Till, J.E. [ed.]; PB: 377 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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