Twenty-five years after the nuclear meltdown in Chernobyl, the aftermath continues to affect more than a million children in and around the contaminated area. There has been a 250 percent increase in congenital birth deformities since the explosion, a 100 percent increase in the incidence of cancer and leukemia and a staggering 2,400 percent increase in the incidence of thyroid cancer. Other disorders, including congenital heart diseases, have also increased significantly.
CCI’s Medical Programme helps treat these children, save their lives, ease their pain and sometimes simply make them more comfortable during their final days. We send volunteer doctors and nurses to provide medical treatment and train local medical workers. We fund life-saving operations and purchase much-needed medical equipment. And we coordinate facilities that care for children with special needs—children who would otherwise be abandoned or placed in institutional care.
Learn more about our many medical programme areas:
Cardiac Programme
The heart is one of the organs most vulnerable to the effects of radiation, and every year, 6,000 children in the Ukraine are born with genetic heart diseases and defects, including the deadly condition known as “Chernobyl Heart.”
Over 68% of all deaths in Ukraine are due to cardiovascular disease alone. More than 50% of children are not operated on because of lack of facilities and training. Under-five mortality rate in Ukraine is 15% (in UK – 5%) and is attributed mainly to congenital heart disease.
Only half of affected children will receive the surgeries that they need to survive: the rest will die within three to five years. CCI manages and delivers a world-recognised Cardiac Programme that has saved the lives of thousands of children. In collaboration with the American cardiac surgeon Dr. William Novick, CCI has reduced a waiting list for cardiac surgeries in Belarus from 7,000 to less than 2,500 children in just five years. Another 6,000 children will be operated on in 2010/2011.
Volunteer surgical teams travel throughout the Ukraine and Belarus to perform surgeries that save lives, as well as to train local physicians. This training develops local capacity, enabling local surgical teams to treat the children in their own area more effectively.
During each trip, the surgical teams are able to save the lives of 25 to 30 children, at a cost of just €1,000 per operation.
To find out how your organisation or business can sponsor a life-saving mission to Ukraine or Belarus, or to enquire about becoming a volunteer, please contact us today on +353 21 431299 or info@chernobyl-international.com.
Photos from our latest Cardiac Mission - Young Miracles!
Baby Bogdan’s Story by Adi Roche
Baby Bogdan had 10% chance of survival
In September 2011, I visited a run down and ill-equipped children's hospital in Kharkiv, Ukraine. A volunteer surgical team funded by CCI worked alongside local medical teams to perform free heart operations. The first bed I stopped at when I went into the ICU held a tiny baby boy named Bogdan. He was so small that I almost missed him -- except that all the medical equipment attached to him drew my attention to look closer.
I could immediately see that he was in distress. His veins in his chest were enlarged, and the rapid rise and fall of his chest was unnatural. The volunteers told me that he was an abandoned baby with a poor prognosis. In fact, he had only a 10% chance of survival -- he had only about 72 hours left in this world.
A Little Miracle!
Bogdan was gently wrapped in a warm blanket and carried to the operating theatre where we all watched and awaited the outcome. Afterwards, the surgeons gathered us around his bed, with tentative grins and relief on their faces.
“Bogdan’s chances have improved to 50%. We think he’s going to make it! He’s a plucky little one, a real fighter!” Our little one survives. These sorts of miracles happen every time we are able to send a volunteer cardiac team to Kharkiv.
Life-Saving Operations Programme
Many children of Chernobyl need very specialised surgical interventions in order to survive and live fuller, more active lives. However, the skilled surgeons and advanced equipment and facilities needed to treat them often do not exist locally. In these cases, the children must be flown to other countries where these resources are available.
CCI founder, Adi Roche, made her first life-saving excursion in 1991, transporting four very ill children from Belarus to Ireland for life-saving surgery. Since then, more than 300 children have benefited from the programme.
Many children are still waiting for a life-saving operation, and you can sponsor one today. Young children like Sasha, Polina and Nastya can be given a chance to walk again, live to adulthood or simply live without pain thanks to your generous donation. Visit our "Sponsor a child” page to learn more.
Nursing Programme
The Nursing Programme provides care for 160 children living in the Vesnova Children's Mental Asylum. As well as significantly improving the quality of life and medical care for these children, the programme provides employment and skills training to more than 40 health professionals and nurses on staff.
The programme staffs, trains and pays local health professionals to work in understaffed children’s institutions in Belarus. These staff members are supported by teams of volunteer health professionals from Ireland who come over each month to manage and oversee the programme and offer support to their Belarusian counterparts.
In addition to providing quality care for the children, the programme offers medical training to local care workers, enabling the community to become self-sufficient and better able to meet the needs of the local population.
If you are a medical professional interested in volunteering on the Nursing Programme, please email us at info@chernobyl-international.com or call +353 21 4312999.
Dental Care Programme
Dental care is integral to good health, but for many children in Belarus, good dental care is simply not available. Even more disturbing, many children in institutional care must undergo painful procedures such as tooth extraction without anaesthetic.
The Dental Care Programme currently offers a high level of oral care and more humane treatments to the residents of Vesnova Children’s Mental Asylum and Soltanovka Adult Mental Asylum.
The volunteer dental team, flown in from Ireland, works with the nursing and care staff at both institutions to ensure excellent care for the institutionalised children and adults.
If you are a dental professional and would like to volunteer for the next dental team, please contact us at info@chernobyl-international.com, or call +353 21 431299.
You can also contribute to this worthwhile programme by becoming a “Tooth Fairy!” With a donation of just €30, you can put an end to the pain and trauma a child experiences during a dental procedure administered without anaesthetic. Visit our
Donate page to make your donation and end this needless suffering.
Mental Health Initiatives
CCI is working closely with the International Initiative for Mental Health Leadership in the US and other agencies to address disability issues among young adults in Belarus. The majority of people with disabilities do not have access to services, particularly in rural areas. Many children and young adults are institutionalised in substandard, unhygienic conditions where they live with little dignity, inadequate intellectual stimulation and no hope of gaining any level of independence.
CCI has already been able to make a difference in the lives of the children living in the Vesnovo Children's Mental Asylum and the Soltanovka Adult Mental Asylum, transforming these institutions from places of suffering and hopelessness into attractive, supportive environments that offer adequate medical supervision and opportunities for recreation and stimulation.
Medical and Special-Needs Equipment
CCI is dedicated to providing medical and special-needs equipment that saves lives and improves the quality of life for sick children.
For instance, the purchase of 40 specially moulded wheelchairs allowed children with conditions such as cerebral palsy to sit upright while being fed. Although it may seem like a small thing, these children were at risk of asphyxiation because they had to be fed lying down. Now, they can sit in an upright position for the first time. Other specially adapted chairs can help delay the onset and progression deformities among these children.
CCI also provides state-of-the-art equipment and technology for the Cardiac Programme, including:
- An echocardiogram for the Institute of General and Urgent Surgery of AMS in the Ukraine
- A life-saving anaesthetic machine for Gomel Regional Hospital
- A Somanetics Cardiac Oximter, which saves the lives of as many as 175 children a year by allowing surgeons to non-invasively monitor oxygen levels in a patient's brain and kidneys while on bypass during surgery
You can help CCI purchase much-needed medical and special-needs equipment by making a donation today.