The Crime of Chernobyl- The Nuclear Gulag

by Wladimir Tchertkoff

  Sushkevich duty, as a highly placed WHO official, was to encourage research and medical aid for the liquidators rather than to give a funeral eulogy for those whose heroic lives have been destroyed.

  Angelina Guskova (Institute of Biophysics, Moscow).—I would like to say something on this subject. The specific nature of radioactivity is that we have no sense receptors that can feel it or measure it inside our bodies. It is very important to us that we can distinguish between useful heat and dangerous heat, useful cold and dangerous cold. This internal measure does not exist in our bodies for radiation. And so the main way we perceive radiation is through our information systems. And these information systems create conditions for the mythologizing of the degree of danger. This has been described very well by the social psychologists today. I thoroughly approve of their work and I believe today that for the situation to return to normal we do not need to lower the dose of radioactivity which is already very low but rather to rebuild social structures, employment, medical aid for those, whose illness is not caused by radiation but in whom illness has appeared. I think that this is the most important and useful approach for them.

  In a chemical accident, the effects are easier to diagnose clinically. Bhopal not only caused a colossal number of victims but also a great many cases of abnormalities and serious illness. In other words, the gravity of the accident was demonstrated by the concrete existence of serious illnesses. With radioactivity, we are talking about the potential effects in future generations. We have not found this to be the case at Hiroshima, where no genetic effects have been found. We need to monitor the situation, but for the moment we do not have many reasons to think there are immediate effects, and even fewer reasons to think there may be effects in the next twenty five generations.

  An anonymous woman from the back of the hall asks to speak.

  Woman.—The doses recorded in the liquidators’ documents do not reflect the real doses that they received. When the dosimeter is calibrated to measure a maximum of 2 roentgens, we wrote 2 roentgens on their papers. Often the fire chief had a collective dosimeter. In those cases, they would average out the doses received by the whole brigade. When the maximum admissible dose was set at 25, they marked 24.8 or 24.9…if it was set at 15, they marked 14.8 or 14.9…

  The methods that we use when we study changes in health in these people are objective. I see these people from every corner of Russia. They could not have agreed amongst themselves, yet they all have the same complaints: headaches, pain in their bones. A neurosis cannot appear in so similar a fashion in everyone, not a mosaic, but a precisely drawn syndrome. We are not talking here about a direct radiological lesion to the brain, Angelina Guskova. We respect, read and honour the work you do, but we are dealing here with completely new data. It requires further investigation. Yes, we have our own experience, particular dogmas from the past but we should not rely on these alone. We are talking here about long term effects that do not result from “radiation sickness”. Long term effects preceded moreover by a latency period. They do not appear straight away but one, two, three, five years later. There is a kind of mechanism that is set in motion. Today we are finding changes in the immune system. We are even finding changes in the liquidators’ children. They have psychogenetic alterations. These children are developing a type of immunodeficiency. It is our genetic heritage that we are concerned with here, and we absolutely have to protect it and restore it.

  The president asks if one of the psychiatrists can give their opinion.

  Rumiantseva.—The men involved in this accident who received a dose…(she corrects herself) We will leave aside the question of your dose, we are looking at the perception of this dose. A perceived dose can often produce the same effect as the biological dose. And it is not by chance that we end up at this point because prolonged stress and prolonged biological action have the same effect.

  In the same year, 1986, when I was working at Chernobyl, there was the Nakhimov boat accident, do you remember? The psychological trauma there was terrible. And the victims of that traumatic event are still suffering today. Nobody could deny that what those people are suffering today is due to the shock they received fifteen years ago. Why should we deny that what is happening with our liquidators also is due to serious psychological trauma, of which the radiation dose they received is certainly not the principal element? I am not going to discuss it, I am not a radiobiologist, but I can confirm that if I have a liquidator in front of me, and their clinical record does not mention this psychological trauma and at the end of fifteen years, it has become a severe psycho-physical syndrome, the logical conclusion for me would be that this man’s illness was linked to this trauma.

  Anatoli Saragovets was able to crack jokes with his dog while his living body decomposed. Piotr Shashkov decided to be optimistic, even though the flesh was coming away from the bone on his leg ( the one that had been pressed against the side of the tank he was driving). Victor Kulikovsky, crippled with illness, put his own troubles aside and thought only of his son, who had been born with a birth defect, caused by his father’s psychological trauma, according to Rumiantseva’s theory... These healthy young men did not realise that, in 1986, the real catastrophe was not the smoking ruins of the reactor, vomiting out its tons of radionuclides, but the fragility of their minds. The dose they received was certainly not the principal element that caused their illness, claims Rumiantseva!

  Preobrazhenskaya.—Can I make a brief comment?

  Zupka (he is chairing the meeting).—Briefly, if you don’t mind, we haven’t got much time.

  Preobrazhenskaya.—I am extremely concerned and alarmed that an eminent scientist such as Mme Guskova keeps repeating that it was “fifteen years ago and they were very low doses” But she doesn’t mention the fact that these doses accumulate. You do not say that you are worried about future generations. You don’t want to know. But we already know the future generations. Because the children who were irradiated have become mothers and fathers, and we already have their descendants. But the most important thing, Dr Guskova, is that we cannot go on comparing the tragedy, the terrible tragedy of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to Chernobyl. Because there, the chain reaction has come to a halt, whereas here it is still going on: plutonium lasts 24,000 years, americium has appeared here and the radiation continues forever, as does the internal radiation. Strontium dissolves in water and we are irrigating our fields all along the Dnieper river—don’t interrupt me!—with this water. Radionuclides are taken up by the plants, the cows eat them. This explains precisely the slow accumulation of low doses… Think about it and don’t go along with the IAEA when they cover up the tragedy. We don’t want demonstrations, we don’t want to frighten people, we want a scrupulous approach, international, communal.

  BREAK

  Standing near the podium, Professor Yarmonenko is talking to a member of congress not far from our microphone.

  Yarmonenko.—You have eaten, and you evacuate. Everything you have eaten today, has been eliminated, including nuclides… All the rest of it, it’s just rubbish. You need to understand that!

  Member of congress.—No, you’re right, but you need to look at the balance that is established from ingestion on a daily basis and what is evacuated.

  Yarmonenko.—What balance? The balance is in one direction only: it’s e-va-cua-ted! It doesn’t increase, it decreases. This is how the world works!

  The organisers announce a round table discussion after the break. I go up onto the stage to ask how the discussion will take place in the hall so that I can organise filming around it. Yarmonenko is up on the stage also talking to Madame Nyagu, the president of the organising committee, because he is worried about the round table discussion. Romano sees us and joins us quickly on the stage. As he passes by he films their conversation. We owe this little masterpiece to the instant reflex, presence of mind and skill of the cameraman. Capturing a unique moment such as this is only possible thank
s to the creative equality and mutual understanding between the members of the crew.

  Yarmonenko.—It’s a disaster, there’s no doubt about it. But not from a radiological point of view.

  Nyagu.—Samuil Petrovich, calm down! You are like Angelina Konstantinovna, an unquiet spirit.

  —How can I calm down? I’m going to have to rewrite the next edition of my book, my manual, and it’s a shambles.

  —You need to understand that there is going to be a great deal of agitation now with the final resolution. We will work on it again with you tonight.

  —Willingly.

  —Even the IAEA recognises that we need to work around the difficult issues but you, you shoot on sight.

  —That’s true. It is good to be diplomatic, but ignorance has to be excluded. We can only accept expert opinions.

  Q.—So, according to you, it wasn’t a radiological accident?

  —Radioactivity is one factor among many. But it is the least significant.

  —Really!

  —Who is this?

  —A television journalist…

  —What? Television?

  —Swiss television.

  —Ah, that’s nothing. Swiss television is like ours.

  A little later, we come across Yarmonenko under siege in the centre of the hall from a group of women doctors, to whom he is giving a science lesson about radiation. Other conference members are curious and have gathered round to observe the scene.

  A woman doctor.—We do not know what effect these low doses of radiation will have, that constantly...

  Yarmonenko.—(cutting her off in a professorial manner) Why do you say “We don’t know”? How can you say “We don’t know”? We know more about radioactivity than about any other environmental factor. Why? Because we have been studying radioactivity for a hundred years already and it’s just one factor. With other factors, like toxic substances for instance, there are hundreds. To say we don’t know when we know everything about radioactivity! Chernobyl has not taught us anything new. It may have taught something to people who don’t know anything about it…and who are starting to learn now.

  —This is a unique situation, different from all others.

  —Absolutely not.

  —Chronic and permanent.

  —Absolutely not! ... Absolutely not!!

  Second woman doctor.—No, listen, we have presented our reports in Moscow. We are conducting long term experiments, we are introducing low doses of caesium…

  —On who?

  —On animals, rats…

  —So what? I’ve been doing these experiments all my life! Rats, alright!

  —600 becquerels, is that a high or a low dose?

  —What becquerels? Give me the incorporated dose…Have you calculated that?

  —Incorporated dose: 0.3 centigrey173.

  173 See glossary, page 599.

  —That’s a low dose. For rats, yes, it’s tiny.

  —A tiny dose.

  —Yes, tiny. Not acute, not chronic…

  —Are alterations possible?

  —No, there shouldn’t be! ... And if you have found any, you need to verify it ten times. Because if this is what you are claiming, it contradicts the existing scientific conventions. You need to understand this once and for all.

  —What must we “understand”, if this is what we are “seeing”?

  —Look at it again ten times.

  —We have looked at it ten times.

  —No, you haven’t. Look me in the eyes.

  —I’m looking at you.

  —I’m telling you, you haven’t looked at it ten times.

  —This is research done with an electronic microscope. We have published; our research has been published…

  —That has no importance.

  —…and we ask that someone refutes it.

  —Why refute it?

  —Why has no scientist come forward to refute it, I can’t understand it!

  —No. Listen. Listen to me. Okkam’s principle—listen to me!—is the only scientific principle here. This is what it says: we can never reject anything, at whatever level of knowledge. It isn’t possible.

  —No, of course not.

  —But, if we claim that something is so, we must be able to demonstrate that it exists.—The value of that demonstration comes down to two things. The first is that your findings can be reproduced by any other person, and initially by you, and the second is that they should not contradict a large body of previous findings. If they do, you need to try and understand yourself why they contradict it.

  —We are talking about internal radiation.

  —It’s not important whether it’s internal or external.

  —I have analysed an enormous amount of material published on the effects of low dose radiation. Chronic low dose radiation is something else altogether.

  —What difference does that make? There is less effect.

  —I think that if these low level doses are incorporated chronically, they represent a danger.

  —But have you studied my course book or not? I’m sorry but you can just go to hell! It is written on every page that because there are molecular mechanisms that repair DNA, it repairs much more easily with a low dose of radiation than with an acute dose. We have established norms about the effects of acute radiation and the effects of chronic radiation: chronic radiation has been shown to be three or four times less dangerous, according to different of indices. But you, you’re saying the exact opposite. It’s appalling! There is a whole repair mechanism that has evolved…All this talk about greater harm at low doses—that Burlakova is explaining—she’s not explaining, she’s rambling—it’s absurd.

  The third woman doctor.—How do you explain the thyroid disease then? How? It’s on the increase.

  —But it’s not increasing at all. We all understand that the dosimetry at Chernobyl was faulty. We should not forget that. All that is true. But there is the clinical evidence.

  —That’s why we shouldn’t be talking about dose, but simply about illness.

  —There you are, you have been shown today in a series of talks with excellent data that an elementary cure in good conditions, at St Petersburg, gets rid of these symptoms within a month. What are we talking about?

  —It’s temporary. It is a temporary improvement. After a year, it starts again…

  —Have you been there? Where have you heard this?

  —I have been working for fifteen years on this. After a year, it starts again.

  The first woman doctor.—You talk about repair mechanisms. But the repair processes are not infinite.

  —What do you mean, not infinite! You can’t say that! Can’t you read? You said you’ve read my material. Go and read the chapter about repair mechanisms again and come and see me tomorrow, we will talk about it again. What you are saying at the moment has no basis in reality. We are going to adopt the resolution, I insist categorically on educating people. This incredible ignorance and lack of training in radiological matters is inadmissible in doctors. If, God help us, something else happened tomorrow, we would need to know what to do. There is no guarantee that it won’t happen. The issue of radioprotection is very important.

  Preobrazhenskaya.—We are going to hear from Professor Grodzinsky in a minute, he’s going to talk about low dose radiation too. Alice Stewart, a well known American scientist, also talks about it, an excellent scientist, she has also studied it…

  Yarmonenko.—It’s not important, Stewart or no Stewart…

  Preobrazhenskaya.—Yes, Yarmonenko or no Yarmonenko, it’s not important…What is important is that children are dying because of low dose radiation.

  THE ROUND TABLE

  Mikhail Savkin (ICRP vice-director of the Scientific Centre at the Institute of Biophysics in Moscow).—This is a s
cientific conference essentially. To this effect, we would like specialists, if they are specialists, to talk about their own field of expertise, rather than recounting half baked theories about radioactive wood that we have heard here. We have known for a very long time, it has been shown—and the member of the Ukrainian Centre for Radioprotection must know this—that the part played by internal radiation is insignificant in comparison to external. People have been terrorised for fifteen years…

  Preobrazhenskaya.—The smoke, does that mean anything to you? What is smoke?

  Savkin.—I’ve finished.

  Solange Fernex (Honorary Deputy of the European Parliament, Solange Fernex was at the time of the conference, president of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, French section).—I totally agree with the professor from Moscow who thinks the experts must speak about their area of expertise, and that health is really a matter for doctors. This is the motive for our great determination to amend the agreement between the World Health Organization and the International Agency for Atomic Energy. If we want an informed public opinion and a good psychological response to accidents, we must have transparency. We must eliminate conflicts of interest and make sure that the people who talk about genetics are the geneticists, nuclear physicists talk about the nuclear industry, about radiation and not about the effects on the cell, on the pancreas, on mitochondria, on DNA. That is the task of doctors and we must listen to them.