- 11
and power station personnel
died from radiation injuries.
Hundreds
The
were hospitalized after the accident and, although all have since left
the hospitals, there are increased risks of cancer among them as among
the general population in that part of the Soviet Union. These risks
should not be belittled, but we must preserve a sense of proportion.
Risks must always be compared with those of alternative activities.
risks of additional cancer cases from Chernobyl may be counted in
thousands over the next seventy years, but the risks of cancer in the
same population from other causes must be counted in millions. The
reality is that most human activities and certainly all energy
production
entail some risk to numan life from accicents.
This is
true of hydropower with dams that burst, coal power with its mining
accidents, gas power with its explosion risks and oil power, with its
fire risks and environmentally disastrous spills.
Where
Chernobyl and the enormous media coverage of it certainly caused
some loss of public confidence in nuclear power in many countries.
governments nave remained firmly supportive of nuclear power, as in the
UK or in France, this loss of confidence nas not been severe or
шутли politically crippling. In other countries, like Sweden, where
governments nave taken stands negative to nuclear power, public
confidence has been further undermined.
A major challenge today is to regain the earlier confidence in
nuclear power as a clean and safe energy option everywhere.
Chernobyl accident, the IAEA's Member States turned to the Agency as an
instrument of and forum for enhanced international co-operation in
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