Mushrooms are very popular and cheap, being collected from the woods by children and their families and then dried for future use in a variety of Belarusian dishes.

After a delightful Belarusian meal, a visiting host family was presented with a bag of dried mushrooms to take home to Inverness. On their return, the visiting hosts thought - "I wonder if these mushrooms are contaminated?"

A radiation protection advisor at the Medical Physics Laboratory at Raigmore Hospital, Inverness, promptly agreed to test them. The hosts were able to watch the green line on the oscilloscope rise to a peak, which proved to be 20 times above the permitted EU levels of radiation for similar imported products.

The advisor stressed that there would be no harm caused by handling these mushrooms, but regular ingestion could expose any individual to long-term increased risk of fatal cancer.

She also said it would be several decades before the land would be clear of radiation and meantime, food produced in contaminated areas of Belarus would continue to be consumed by the country's inhabitants.

(Abbreviated from an article in The Highland News by Donald Wilson)

One of the images to the right shows the tested mushrooms, contaminated by Caesium 137. They were picked in a beautiful area close to a river, where families go to enjoy picnics. When picked and later tested in Scotland in 2002, these mushrooms were found to be 20 times above the safe limit for Caesium 137.

Effects of Contamination

The affected population - those exposed to radioactive fallout, remaining in the affected areas, or forced to relocate - continue to face disproportionate suffering in terms of health, social conditions and economic opportunity. Thousands of people have been evacuated from the most severely affected areas. Many found it difficult to adapt and continue to face serious psychological, economic and social problems. (Extract from 'The Human Consequences of the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident - A Report Commissioned by UNDP and UNICEF - 25 January 2002)

It was concluded that the Chernobyl accident has had a significant long-term impact on psychological well-being, health related quality of life and illness in the affected populations. (Agence pour l'energie nucleaire - Nuclear Energy Agency - 2002 Update of Chernobyl: Ten Years On)

Soil contamination with Cs137, Sr90 and Pu239 is still high and in Belarus, the most widely contaminated Republic, eight years after the accident, 2,640 square km's of agricultural land had been excluded from use. (Agence pour l'energie nucleaire - Nuclear Energy Agency - 2002 Update of Chernobyl: Ten Years On)

Most people think of the nuclear accident at Chernobyl as an event that has been consigned to history, but the truth is that the accident continues to have a devastating impact on the populations of three countries. In fact, although almost fifteen years have passed since the event, the worst effects on the health of the people affected may well be yet to come. While the explosive stories of the meltdown and clouds of radiation have long since faded from the headlines, the real human, economic, social, health and environmental catastrophe has only just begun. (Extract from Belarus Government Website - May 2003)

The number of people with thyroid cancer began to increase about five years after the accident This number continues to rise. In some areas the incidence is over a hundred times higher than before the accident. Scientists originally predicted that the incidence would not peak until 2006, and it was expected that the figure would eventually reach 6,600, but recently the number of cases has exceeded expectations. Over 3,000 cases of thyroid cancer have already been reported. (Extract from Belarus Government Website - May 2003)

Radioactive contamination is an invisible aura. The meadows around Chernobyl are teeming with wildlife. The rivers teem with fish that have been allowed to grow unhooked to over ten feet long. At first glance it could be the Garden of Eden, for radiation is not only invisible, it cloaks itself in nature. Around Chernobyl, nature is protected from man by contamination. But you can feel that something is horribly wrong. Radiation has an evil aura, which is partly physical and partly perceived, but both are equally real. The physical aspect is the irradiated particles that release energy in the process of decay, which can damage living tissue. The perceived aspect is the feeling of being surrounded by an invisible danger that we know can harm us, but that we do not understand. This feeling is shared by more than seven million people and is as harmful as the physical effects of radiation exposure.

Visit Chernobyl information: 'Some facts about Chernobyl are uncertain, or disputed. In such cases we follow our principles by presenting the different interpretations and citing the sources. www.chernobyl.info thus lives up to its stated goal of providing independent and impartial information.'

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