Uploaded April 2021 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
U.N. websites say that 33 people died from the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe and 6,000 children got cancer. Is that the extent of the damage? Working through newly disclosed Soviet health archives, historian Kate Brown discovered that Soviet doctors reported a public health disaster in the Chernobyl-contaminated territories in the late 1980s. The archives shows a death toll of not 35, but 35,000 and tens of thousands hospitalized after the disaster. What happened to this story? Brown explores international archives to show how evidence of widespread health problems from Chernobyl exposures disappeared from the scientific consensus.
Speaker: Kate Brown, Professor of Science, Technology and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Welcome remarks: Jessika Woroniak, Master of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Welcome remarks: Allison Macfarlane, Professor and Director, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Moderator: Professor Ramana, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Co-hosted by: The School of Public Policy and Global Affairs; History Department; Graduate Program in Science and Technology Studies, UBC
Visit sppga.ubc.ca for all upcoming events.
U.N. websites say that 33 people died from the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe and 6,000 children got cancer. Is that the extent of the damage? Working through newly disclosed Soviet health archives, historian Kate Brown discovered that Soviet doctors reported a public health disaster in the Chernobyl-contaminated territories in the late 1980s. The archives shows a death toll of not 35, but 35,000 and tens of thousands hospitalized after the disaster. What happened to this story? Brown explores international archives to show how evidence of widespread health problems from Chernobyl exposures disappeared from the scientific consensus.
Speaker: Kate Brown, Professor of Science, Technology and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Welcome remarks: Jessika Woroniak, Master of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Welcome remarks: Allison Macfarlane, Professor and Director, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Moderator: Professor Ramana, School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, UBC
Co-hosted by: The School of Public Policy and Global Affairs; History Department; Graduate Program in Science and Technology Studies, UBC
Visit sppga.ubc.ca for all upcoming events.
