Doses of up to 1,000 rad kill the cells of the thyroid, including any cancer cells. Hypothyroidism is especially for a child as it leads to irreversible consequences and abnormal development. The incidence of anemia in children has gone up 1.5 to 3 times since 1986. There are also more tumors. The number of cases in Belarus as a whole has risen from 230 to 250 per 100,000 over the last 3 years.
Birth defects are another growing problem in Belarus.
There were 5.65 cases per 1,000 births in 1986, and today the figure is 6.89 in the strict control zones. The figure was 5.64 cases per 1,000 in Gomel province in 1986, while in 1989 it rose to 9.2 cases per 1,000 births. Infant mortality is rising in certain regions. In Khoiniki, for example, the 1986 figure was 8.8 and the 1989 figure was 14.5 per 1,000 births. Studies show that such disorders are three to four times more common in the children of the strict zones than in the children of the relatively clean areas.