Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster

by Svetlana Alexievich

They pulled science and medicine into politics. Of course they did!

But they’re worried about their authority, not about the people. It was a country of authority, not people. The State always came first, and the value of a human life was zero. Because they might have found ways—without any announcements, without any panic. They could simply have introduced iodine into the freshwater reservoirs, or added it to the milk. The city had 700 kilograms of iodine concentrate for that very purpose—but it just stayed where it was. People feared their superiors more than they feared the atom.

I have information indicating that the bosses were taking iodine. When my colleagues at the Institute gave them checkups, their thyroids were clean. Without iodine that’s impossible. And they quietly got their kids out of there, too, just in case. And when they went into the area themselves they had gas masks and special robes—the very things everyone else lacked.

“Does the tractor driver at least wear a gas mask?” “No, they don’t wear them.” “What, you didn’t get them?” “Oh, we got plenty! We have enough to last until the year 2000. We just don’t give them out, otherwise there’d be a panic. Everyone would run off, they’d leave.” “How can you do that?” “Easy for you to say, Professor. If you lose your job, you’ll find another one. Where am I going to go?”