Regina (7) has four major heart defects. Her mother, Luba Chychkalova (44), is of course very worried about the girl’s health. Regina needs heart surgery urgently. “The operation would be too risky in Russia, but we have no money to take Regina to Germany, where the operation has less of a risk”. Regina already had heart surgery before and her over-all health situation is very weak. Like many other children in the area, she was born with Down syndrome. Chychkalova is the assistant director at one of Muslyumovo’s kindergartens. “Half the children here have illnesses”, she says. Luba Chychkalova has two other, healthy, children and has adopted a girl that was orphaned after the girl’s mother died of radiation related cancer. Chychkalova’s own mother died of brain cancer at the age of 51. Her brother died of abdominal cancer when he was only 35 years old. Chychkalova, her husband and her children now live outside Muslyumovo in one of the houses built for evacuees, but she is sceptical: “Even if you get evacuated, you still take your illnesses with you”.