Populations Living near the Semipalatinsk Test Site: A New Cohort for Assessing Health Effects from Protracted Exposures to Low-to-moderate Doses of Radiation

Abstract

Although numerous epidemiological studies have demonstrated an increased risk of cancer and non-cancer diseases associated with acute exposures to high doses of radiation, possible effects of protracted exposures to low-to-moderate doses of radiation remain to be investigated. Several epidemiological studies have been conducted for residents living near the Semipalatinsk Test Site in the former Soviet Union who were exposed to protracted low-to-moderate doses of both external and internal radiations. However, small population size and other limitations of the previous studies preclude a precise evaluation of the health effects. An international joint study of Kazakhstan and Japan was initiated in 2001 to investigate the health effects among residents of the exposed areas based on a new large-scale cohort of the Semipalatinsk populations. In the joint study, information was obtained on the name, date of birth, sex, residential history and vital status of individuals living in the former collected, among which the vital status of 41,128 residents (30.7%) was ascertained. The completeness of the ascertainment depended on the place of residence with lower completeness for control areas mainly because of emigration. Although any analysis based on retrospective follow-up data is limited because of potential selection bias, the sub-population of our established cohort will be a useful resource for future prospective studies.

Dose Reconstruction for Residents Near the Former Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Sites with a Focus on the Study of Radiation Health Effects

“…In the study, a cohort was established and the overview of the cohort has been introduced in a previous publication. 3) The purpose of the present paper is to describe the method used for dose reconstruction and the resulting doses for an individual member of the cohort, which is the basis of the dose assessment used in our study on radiation health effects. In this paper, we provide information about the doses for the reference residents of the cohort.…”