Health status and internal radiocontamination assessment in children exposed to the fallout of the Chernobyl accident

The Chernobyl fallout caused release of radioisotope contaminants in a very large area that includes Belarus, the Ukraine, and the Russian Federation. In this study, the authors monitored the health status and level of intern al contamination in 422 children who resided in the aforementioned areas an d who were less than or equal to 10 gamma of age at the time of the acciden t. The children came to Italy for a 1-mo period between 1991 and 1992. Duri ng this time, the children underwent pediatric checkups and biochemical, im munological, and thyroid analyses. All children underwent whole-body counte r measurements, and urine radiotoxicological analysis was performed for 224 of them. The 24 children evacuated from Pripiat, a village very close to t he Chernobyl reactor site, were selected for cytogenetic analysis. All of t hese children continue to have a detectable internal contamination of caesi um radioisotopes. This condition is likely the result of ground and foodstu ff contamination in the various areas. The children did not evidence overt pathologies related to ionizing radiation. However, minor alterations in im munological and thyroid parameters were observed in the group of the evacua ted children. Traditional cytogenetic dosimetry was not possible, but the o ccurrence of acentric fragments was observed-indicating a persistent effect of continuous exposure to low doses of radiation.