After the Chernobyl disaster, about 6, 000 children exposed to radiation later developed thyroidcancer, because many drank contaminated milk after the accident.
Elsewhere, concerns were raised over the failing health of the chief justice of the Supreme Court , William Rehnquist, after he revealed he was receiving chemotherapy and radiation treatment for his thyroidcancer.
Ingestion of the short-lived isotope iodine-131, with its well-known risk of thyroidcancer when absorbed in the thyroid glands of children and young people, was the only major radiation-related health effect of the Chernobyl accident on the public.