Records of the UCRM chart the decline in health of 28,000 people along the Techa and all of them are classed as seriously irradiated. Since the 1960s, these people have been examined regularly by public health officials. According to the head of the UCRM clinical department the rate of leukemia has doubled in the last two decades. Skin cancers have quadrupled over the last 33 years. Kosenko carried out a small epidemiological study of 100 people selected at random.
Local doctors estimate that half the men and women at child bearing age are sterile.
Even today, the local population still does not know the actual levels of radioisotopes in its home grown products. Only since 1989, the villagers have started to get information about the dangers of the radioactive contamination of their river. Half of these people were evacuated eight months after the accident These people had been consuming contaminated food without restriction, since the accident and until their evacuation. The 4800 residents nearest to the lake received an average dose of 13mSv. At present, the ICRP standard is lmSv per year.