Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster- a Dutch Perspective

What major historical events do you remember?

Chernobyl – April 26, 1986

I had just turned 10 years old a few months before, and on the news was mentioned that a terrible accident had happened at the Chernobyl nuclear plant. One of the reactors had exploded.

At the time of this incident, no one was truly panicking, or even comprehending how big of a disaster this accident really was, and now, years later, we are getting more clarity on the true depths of the impact it had on the area around Chernobyl, and the rest of western Europe.

Precautions were taken, even in The Netherlands, where I am from. We were not allowed to drink any of the fresh milk, eat fresh vegetables like spinach, and even playing in the sandbox or stirring up dirt in your garden was out of the question, until the radiation levels had dropped to acceptable levels. They say that the radioactivity is reduced by half within 8 days. I do not know. I just do not trust when they stated, everything is fine and safe that this was really the truth.

I believe that there were and are major knowledge gaps, and perhaps even coverups where certain dangers were not mentioned as to not panic the population. I also believe that even though the dust settles, you continue to stir up the dust either through wind or through mechanical action so who knows how much radioactive dust we were really exposed to. the dust did not arrive till May 2nd and then in the days following, we had rain.

Now, I realize that the ground and outside one is exposed to low dose of radiation regardless, though what I question is if any dose of radiation that is in the form of dust particles really becomes inactive or just buried.

The reason for my questioning is because I find it truly disturbing that within my family alone many have had cancer or even died of cancer, myself and my mom included. In addition to this, I see a huge amount of people with autoimmune diseases, and it makes me wonder if there are unknowns there that Chernobyl may have done a lot more harm than we were led to believe.

As far as the people in and around Chernobyl, many people died. While there is a lot of discussion about how many people died over time from the radiation exposure, I believe that the numbers are much higher when you count those who have been suffering from various cancers, I found this article which really outlines the extent of the damages that were done. BBC article

There is still a dead zone where no one lives in Chernobyl. The repeated attempts to cover and secure the site from radiation escaping are ongoing, and right now, a huge dome has been constructed to try to contain the radiation.

I live in the U.S. right now, and I have brought up this concern with my rheumatologist and oncologists, and all state that they would not be surprised if…. But that does not matter… what has happened is done.

What we can do though, is learn from disasters such as these and be more proactive and have a plan for when things do go wrong – it doesn’t make a difference on whether this is a nuclear plant, a paint factory, a coal mine or a chemical plant. It does not matter whether it is a disaster, ongoing health risks, or even the risk of a shortage of a product, one should have a plan to be prepared to deal with all these scenarios. When you have an alternate plan, that means, you are educated, you know what to do, when to act and basically, you just reroute to stay out of harms way.