("This is a letter of information from professor Vasili Nesterenko, director of the Institute of Radiation Safety in Minsk. The letter was adressed to the prime minister of Norway, and other ministers of the government of Norway, in a desperate plea for help. Hundreds of children in Belarus are now in great danger of developing cancer and other serious illnesses because of the food they eat, which is still very contaminated. Please read this letter, it will give you a lot of information which I'm sure was unknown to you some minutes ago." )
THE REPUBLIC OF BELARUS -
Institute of Radiation Safety
BELRAD
To Whom It May Concern : Information about the radiation
problems in Belarus - 1998.
We would like you to consider the following information,
which we need to present you. As a result of Chernobyl's catastrophe, 23% of
Belarus' territories were contaminated with radioactive substances, which are
extremely dangerous for people's health. Those were radionuclides of caesium,
strontium and plutonium. While at the pointed areas there live about 2 million
people, 500.000 of which are children, in 3221 aggregations. And the fact that
about 80% of radioactive dozes people get from food, is a characteristic of the
areas. The level of food contamination with radionuclides exceed any possible
acceptable level.
According to the data from the independent local centers of radiation control
and from the state sanitation services, about 25% of the locally produced goods
and food is contaminated with caesium-137 in the territories, which suffered
from Chernobyl catastrophe. The level of contamination exceeds all republican
accepted levels.
According to the data from Belarus' Ministry of Health, in 1997 there were
discovered 567 localities, where milk was contaminated with caesium-137, which
exceeded all accepted levels. There were also registered 47 areas, where milk
was contaminated with strontium-90, which exceeded all accepted levels as well.
High percentage of radionuclides in food causes accumulation of considerable
amounts of radioactivity in the organism of children and grown-ups. That is
proved by the research, made by our Institute. We have at our disposal two
portable laboratories with the spectrometers of men irradiation (SMI), with the
help of which the Institute examined 8,000 children from Chernobyl zone over the
past 2 years.
Most children have the level of accumulated radioactivity in their organism,
making up 600-800 becquerel per kg.
High amounts of the accumulated radioactivity in children's
organism make them weaker and extremely exposed to the diseases. Very often
radioactivity itself becomes a straight reason for children's illnesses.
According to the figures of Professor Yuri I. Bandajevsky at the accumulation of
caeisum-137 in children's organism 30-50 becquerel per kg of the organism
suffers pathological perturbations of the essential organs (heart, kidneys,
liver etc.).
For instance, according to the latest data, the level of malignant oncologic
diseases among children from Brest region (Stolin and Luninetsk districts) is
almost twice as high as the average level in the region. There the frequency of
chronic gastritis is 2-3 times as high as in the most of the more clean areas.
The sickness rate of thyroid gland, lymphatic and hemoplastic in those districts
is 3-5 times as high as the average in the region.
With respect to what is mentioned above, the problem of health care and safety
of more than 500, 000 children, who live in the contaminated areas, is obviously
sharp nowadays.
The problem could be partly decided by providing those children with clean food.
But, unfortunately, the difficult economic situation in Belarus does not let to
do that. The regular treatment of the children at the clean areas is hardly
possible either.
Having the same meals with grown-ups, children get 3-5 times bigger dozes of
radioactivity.
Considering all this, the more easy and accessible way of treating children is
arranging a large-scale and regular examinations of the children with the help
of SMI and also by providing them with pectin medicines, which are able to
string radionuclides and to let them rather easily go out of the organism. The
effectiveness of pectin medicines (for instance, "Yablopect") is proved by the
researches, carried out at our institute, when the levels of accumulation of
radionuclides in children's organism were carefully measured by SMI before and
after taking pectin medicines. Their effectiveness is also approved by Belarus'
Ministry of Health, and there is a license of using them.
The large-scale researches with SMI, made by our Institute, showed that one
course of taking "Yablopect" (60 tablets, during a month) lowers the
accumulation of radionuclides in children organism by 30-50%.
Taking into account the received results, the Institute of Radiation Safety
"Belrad" has prepared the project "Radiation monitoring of the children from
Belarus" regions suffered from Chernobyl catastrophe, and providing them with
radiation safety by using pectin medicines".
We present you this project, and we would like you to examine it carefully. We
also beg your financial support for this project in the order of humanitarian
aid.
V. B. Nesterenko
The Director of the Institute of
Radiation Safety "Belrad"
Belarus' Academy of Sciences
The Professor, Doctor of Technical Sciences.
Source: http://home.nvg.org/~praxiz/cc/letter.html (Nettwerksgruppa – Norway)