A 2016 update of the 2006 TORCH (The Other Report on Chernobyl) report finds that the deadly health legacy from the April 26, 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster is far from over, says its author, Dr. Ian Fairlie. The report was commissioned by GLOBAL 2000/ Friends of the Earth Austria and financed by the Vienna Ombuds Office for Environmental Protection. The explosions and resulting graphite fire at Reactor 4 over ten days ejected 30% to 60% of the reactor core’s contents (60–120 tonnes) into the troposphere initially over the USSR and mostnof Europe.
Some of the TORCH-2016 key findings include:
- 40,000 fatal cancers are predicted in Europe over the next 50 years
- 6,000 thyroid cancer cases to date, 16,000 more expected
- 5 million people in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia still live in highly contaminated areas (>40 kBq/m2)
- 400 million in less contaminated areas (>4 kBq/m2)
- 37% of Chernobyl's fallout was deposited on western Europe;
- 42% of western Europe's land area was contaminated
- increased radiogenic thyroid cancers expected in West European countries
- increased radiogenic leukemias, cardiovascular diseases, breast cancers confirmed
- new evidence of radiogenic birth defects, mental health effects and diabetes
- new evidence that children living in contaminated areas suffer radiogenic illnesses