Environment [24]ENS -- Environment News Service
KIEV, Ukraine, April 26, 2000 (ENS) - A unique website, [25]Chernobyl
Charity Online was launched in Kiev, Ukraine prior to today's 14th
anniversary of Chernobyl nuclear explosion - the largest ever
radiation accident involving a nuclear reactor.
By clicking on the links, website visitors can donate medicines to be
paid for by sponsors to Ukrainian Chernobyl hospitals. The website
project has been developed by a team of young Ukrainians aiming to
create a charitable act for Chernobyl victims while using a wide range
of online technologies and know-how.
"Chernobyl.com.ua introduces an absolutely new for Ukraine and the
whole CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] concept of electronic
charity, or "click charity," Denis Oleinikov, Chernobyl.com.ua
founder, said today.
The explosion and fire at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor near Kiev on
April 26, 1986 has killed 15,000 members of the clean-up teams, while
another 30,000 people have become disabled during the 14 year
aftermath, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Shoigu said in Moscow
today.
Addressing a memorial ceremony at a Moscow cemetery, Shoigu said that
the government is doing its best to ensure safety at nuclear power
plants and prevent such tragedies from happening again.
The heavy radioactive contamination that spread over large areas of
Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine exposed what new United
Nations figures now show are seven million people to ionizing
radiation caused by fallout of radioactive nuclides.
This has led so far to a large increase in thyroid cancer among
children in affected areas.
A report on the effects of Chernobyl released by the United Nations
this week, forecast even worse health problems ahead for more than
seven million people affected by the accident.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan acknowledged in a foreword to the
report that the exact number of victims may never be known, but that
three million children need treatment and "many will die prematurely."
In an effort to medicines to Chernobyl victims, Chernobyl Charity
Online uses the new Internet pattern of website visitor donations made
with the click of a mouse. The donations are paid for by sponsors, not
by the visitors.
Anybody in the world can contribute to donating medicines for
Ukrainian Chernobyl hospitals by just clicking on the links from
Chernobyl Charity Online:
http://www.chernobyl.com.ua/
The site also has a unique Chernobyl photo gallery and online charity
shops, where U.S. residents can buy electronics, books, and toys.
There are links to environmental news of the world including daily
Environment News Service reports.
At present, the site is fully in English, but there are plans to
introduce multilingual options.
During the testing period, a total of over 2,000 charity donations
have been made from over 15 countries, enough to buy medicine for
rural Chernobyl hospitals in Ukraine worth US$250.
"We plan to attract three to four thousand visitors every day in two
to three months, which would enable us to buy medicine worth over
US$7,000," said Oleinikov. One hundred percent of commissions received
from the site's sponsors, will go directly to charity, Oleinikov said.
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