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Yablokov: Public Health Consequences of Chernobyl 332.1. Difficulties in ObtainingObjective Data on theCatastrophe’s ImpactFor both subjective and objective reasons,it is very difficult to draw a completepicture of Chernobyl’s influence on publichealth.The subjective reasons include:1. The official secrecy that the USSR imposedon Chernobyl’s public health datain the first days after the meltdown, whichcontinued for more than 3 years—untilMay 23, 1989, when the ban was lifted.During those 3 years an unknown numberof people died from early leukosis.Secrecy was the norm not only in theUSSR, but in other countries as well, includingFrance, Great Britain, and eventhe United States. After the explosion,France’s official Service Central de ProtectionContre les Radiations Ionisantes(SCPRI) denied that the radioactive cloudhad passed over France (CRIIRAD, 2002)and the U.S. Department of Agriculturefailed to disclose that dangerous levels ofChernobyl radionuclides had been foundin imported foods in 1987 and 1988. Thefirst public announcement of these contaminationswas not made until 8 yearslater (RADNET, 2008, Sect. 6 and Sect.9, part 4).2. The USSR’s official irreversible and intentionalfalsification of medical statisticsfor the first 3.5 years after the catastrophe.3. The lack of authentic medical statistics inthe USSR and after its disintegration in1991, as well as in Ukraine, Belarus, andRussia, including health data for hundredsof thousands of people who left the contaminatedterritories.4. The expressed desire of national and internationalofficial organizations and thenuclear industry to minimize the consequencesof the catastrophe.The number of persons added to the Chernobylstate registers continues to grow, even during themost recent years, which casts doubt on the completenessand accuracy of documentation. Dataabout cancer mortality and morbidity are gatheredfrom many and various sources and are codedwithout taking into account standard internationalprinciples ...public health data connected to theChernobyl accident are difficult to compare to officialstate of health statistics ...(UNSCEAR, 2000,Item 242, p. 49).The situation of the liquidators is indicative.Their total number exceeds 800,000 (see ChapterI). Within the first years after the catastropheit was officially forbidden to associate the diseasesthey were suffering from with radiation,and, accordingly, their morbidity data were irreversiblyforged until 1989.EXAMPLES OF OFFICIAL REQUIREMENTS THATFALSIFIED LIQUIDATORS’MORBIDITY DATA:1. “...For specified persons hospitalized after exposureto ionizing radiation and having no signsor symptoms of acute radiation sickness at thetime of release, the diagnosis shall be ‘vegetovasculardystonia.’” [From a letter from theUSSR’s First Deputy Minister of Public HealthO. Shchepin, May 21, 1986, # 02–6/83–6 toUkrainian Ministry of Public Health (cit. by V.Boreiko, 1996, pp. 123–124).]2. “... For workers involved in emergency activitieswho do not have signs or symptoms ofacute radiation sickness, the diagnosis of vegetovasculardystonia is identical to no changein their state of health in connection with radiation(i.e., for all intents and purposes healthyvis-à-vis radiation sickness). Thus the diagnosisdoes not exclude somatoneurological symptoms,including situational neurosis ....” [FromatelegramoftheChiefoftheThirdMainAdministrationof the USSR’s Ministry of Health,E. Shulzhenko, # “02 DSP”-1, dated January4, 1987 (cit. by L. Kovalevskaya, 1995, p. 189).]3. “(1) For remote consequences caused by ionizingradiation and a cause-and-effect relationship,it is necessary to consider: leukemia orleukosis 5–10 years after radiation in doses exceeding50 rad. (2) The presence of acute somaticillness and activation of chronic disease in