Prevalence and risk of chronic diseases among workers of Uranium Processing Enterprise

Risks of somatic diseases among personnel of Uranium Processing Enterprise in Kazakhstan

The prevalence and relative risks of somatic pathology were studied in 912 workers of uranium processing plant. Excessive rough and standardized relative risks for arterial hypertension, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were obtained.

The intensive development of the global economy does not allow for the foreseeable future to eliminate the use of atomic energy. The Republic of Kazakhstan takes one of the leading places in the world on reserves of uranium ore. In 2009, Kazakhstan moved into first place for the extraction of uranium in the world — the extraction of natural uranium was 13 500 tons [1]. Due to productive expansion, a large number of "professionals" and population are involved into impact area of radiation factor; therefore, the assessment of ionization radiation (IR) impact in low doses (LD) on the health of the nuclear fuel complex personnel becomes more acute [2]. Medical and biological effects of chronic exposure to low doses (LD) to the present time are not fully clear, although it is known that the extrapolation of data obtained for high doses of ionization radiation (IR) for the LD is not justified [3, 4]. At this stage, all effects of LD are considered as stochastic, realizing in the form of cancer or genetic disorders. However, as data of the literature give evidence, this is not all manifestations of the low level radiation exposure. These also include the effects of early aging, various metabolic disorders, respiratory diseases - plutonium pneumofibrosis, bronchitis, etc. [5, 6]. According to a number of authors, IR in LD can contribute to a number of somatic diseases. In this case the radiation factor may not play a decisive role, and act as an agent, potentiating impact of traditional risk factors for major somatic diseases [2, 7]. Existing in the available literature data on the prevalence of chronic noninfectious diseases among workers of the nuclear industry are small, fragmented and, in some cases, contradictory [2, 3, 8].