AMERICAN BELARUSSIAN RELIEF ORGANIZATION

On April 26, 1986 the worst nuclear disaster in history took place at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in northern Ukraine. Some scientists say there was 100 times more radiation released than there was when the atomic bomb was dropped at Hiroshima. Belarus, the small country to the north of Ukraine received 70% of the radiation fallout. Since then there has been 200% increase in thyroid diseases and cancers as well as an increase in leukemia, birth defects, and vitamin deficiencies. The disaster left the country as a whole in great need of help. Now their main source of income, agriculture and forestry, is covered in radiation, and with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the country found themselves in severe economic hardship that they have not fully recovered from. Since 1991, over 5,000 children from Belarus have made the trip to the United States for rest and medical evaluation through the efforts of ABRO. Another 400 children have benefited from the summer camps held in the uncontaminated region of Belarus.