The Lasting Legacy Of Nuclear Testing: Lives Still Scarred Decades Later

 

Growing up in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the 1950s and 60s, Mary Dickson was among the millions of American schoolchildren taught to “duck and cover” in the event of a nuclear attack.

“I just remember thinking, ‘That’s not going to save us from a bomb,’” she recalled. At the time, she didn’t know that nuclear weapons were being detonated in the neighboring state of Nevada. Living downwind of the test site meant radioactive fallout often drifted over her community.

Dickson has battled thyroid cancer. Her older sister died young from lupus, her younger sister’s cancer has spread, and her nieces face their own health challenges. She once counted 54 people in her five-block childhood neighborhood who had suffered from cancer, autoimmune diseases, miscarriages, or birth defects.

Although direct cause is difficult to prove, radiation exposure is widely known to increase the risk of cancer. The US Environmental Protection Agency notes that “the higher the dose, the greater the risk.”

Those exposed to fallout in Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington became known as “downwinders.” For survivors, the toll is not only physical but also psychological. “The Cold War for us never ended,” said Dickson, now a playwright and advocate. “We’re still living with its effects.”

A Global Pattern of Suffering

The nuclear age began 80 years ago with the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed more than 100,000 people instantly and led to decades of testing by the world’s nuclear powers. From 1945 to 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out by the United States, Soviet Union, Britain, France, and China. Later, India, Pakistan, and North Korea joined the list, though testing has largely ceased since the 1980s.

These tests often took place in remote areas—Nevada and the Marshall Islands for the US, Kazakhstan for the Soviet Union, French Polynesia for France, Australia and Kiritimati for Britain, and Xinjiang for China. Yet “remote” did not mean uninhabited. Communities living nearby paid the price, suffering health issues, forced relocations, and long-term contamination of their land.

In Kazakhstan, where the Soviet Union carried out more than 450 tests at the Semipalatinsk site, cancer and infant mortality rates soared. In the Marshall Islands, US tests between 1946 and 1958 had the combined power of more than 7,000 Hiroshima bombs, destroying islands and contaminating food sources. Fallout fell like snow on some communities, with lifelong consequences.

Environmental Damage That Endures

The legacy of testing is etched into the environment as well as human health. Radioactive isotopes such as Cesium-137 entered local ecosystems, moving from soil to plants to animals. On the Marshall Islands, researchers have measured radiation levels so high that simply pointing detectors at coconut crabs showed elevated readings.

Even US clean-up efforts left scars. Waste from nuclear projects was dumped into an unlined crater in the Marshall Islands, capped with concrete and now known as the Runit Dome. Questions remain about its long-term safety, particularly as rising seas threaten the structure.

An Ongoing Struggle for Justice

Over time, recognition of the damage has led to partial compensation. The US has paid more than $1.3 billion to downwinders under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. Kazakhstan has included 1.2 million people in its compensation scheme. The Marshall Islands has received aid but continues to press for more.

France and the UK, however, have been slower to acknowledge responsibility. France only began compensating affected Polynesians and Algerians in 2010, and the UK still directs veterans to apply under a general war pensions scheme rather than creating a dedicated program.

For survivors like Mary Dickson, the fight for recognition continues. “You spend the rest of your life worrying that each lump, each pain means it’s back,” she said. Her words reflect the experiences of countless communities across the globe.

The Reckoning Isn’t Over

Eighty years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and decades after the last major atmospheric tests, the legacy of nuclear weapons testing is far from settled. Radiation-related illnesses persist across generations, landscapes remain scarred, and the struggle for justice continues.

The Cold War may be history, but for those who lived downwind—or directly under the mushroom clouds—the fallout has never ended.