The "official" death count as a result of the explosion remains listed as 33, although USA Today [April 4] recently reported that up to 10,000 have now died. 
In summary, it can be stated that: 

       Thirty-one people died in the course of the accident or soon after and another 137 were treated for the acute radiation syndrome. 

       Extensive psychological effects are apparent in the affected regions of the former Soviet Union, manifested as anxiety and stress. Severe forms induce a feeling of apathy and despair often leading to withdrawal. In the rest of the world these individual effects were minimal. 

       In the last decade, there has been a real and significant increase in childhood and, to a certain extent, adult carcinoma of the thyroid in contaminated regions of the former Soviet Union (Wi940) which should be attributed to the Chernobyl accident until proven otherwise. 

       In children, the thyroid cancers are: 
 largely papillary and particularly aggressive in nature often self presenting with local invasion and/or distant metastases,  more prevalent in children aged 0 to 5 years at the time of the accident, and in areas assessed to be the more heavily contaminated with iodine-131,   apparently characterised by a shorter latent period than expected and, still increasing. 

Anthony Robbins, a public-health professor at Boston University, stated last year in 

The New York Times [4/28/90], "Everyone (Soviet epidemiological experts and lay people) you talk to is telling you that every time they look, the situation is worse than before." 

The number of individuals this will ultimately affect has been estimated as high as 11 times that of the cancer deaths expected from the combined 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

Already the toll on living organisms has been grave. During the summer of 1987, over 800,000 individuals were given medical examinations as a result of Chernobyl-related complaints. Unofficial estimates report that an unusually high number of women in the 100-mile radius around Chernobyl feared delivering their babies and aborted their pregnancies. 

CLICK HERE for more information about Adi Roche and her work.....
...with the sick and abandonded children of "The World's Worst Man Made Disaster"

       John O'Mahony 
               reports from the world's only radioactive nature reserve 

               Saturday October 9, 1999 
               The Guardian

UK-CH-093 
             Model of Chornobyl NPP. L to r, Bryan Gore, Bill Madia, interpreter, Boris Oskolkov,
             Terry Lash and interpreter. 1996 March

Some areas near Chernobyl have even now reported the total absence of animal life. Dead rats, mice and other wild or stray animals have been found in massive
quantities. Mutations due to the radiation have resulted in farm animals being born without heads or eyes or internal organs. 

This is due to the fact that radiation levels near Chernobyl have grown higher as a result of the radioactive contamination that has now entered the soil and the food
chain possibly affecting hundreds of thousands of living beings, according to David Marples of the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies. 

For most people living outside the Soviet Union, the Chernobyl "chapter" has long been over. This is in large part due to efforts to understate the seriousness of
the accident. 

UK-CH-115 
             Chornobyl NPP, inside sarcophagus. L to r, Terry Lash (DOE), unidentified man, and
             Bill Madia (PNNL).  1996 March

Time and time again, the Soviet government has acted as if the explosion was only minor. Five days after the lethal explosion and with the public still uninformed
of the potential danger, the May Day parade took place as scheduled some 60 miles south of the plant in the city of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital and one of the
Soviet Union's largest metropolitan areas (population 2.4 million). 

Less than a week later, 250,000 children and pregnant women were evacuated from Kiev. Even last year over 130,000 people from both Ukrainian and
Byelorussian affected regions were relocated. 

Today it is believed that over 4 million people in the Ukraine, Byelorussia and western Russia still live on contaminated ground. Recent relief efforts such as the three-year-old Children of Chernobyl Relief Fund and Project Hope have had some success, according to The New York Times [April 13], with the former
providing over $7 million worth of aid and the latter distributing aid for the US government. 

What remains the largest obstacle for Chernobyl relief organizations is the lack of information and media coverage of the innocent victims' plight here in the West. 
 

Working towards a better world,
The All Planet Euro 2001 Team