By Tim Collins For Mailonline

Russia covered up a nuclear disaster in Kazakhstan in the 1950s that was FOUR TIMES worse than Chernobyl reveals secret report

Between 1949 and 1989 some 456 nuclear tests were carried out at the site

In August 1956 the fallout engulfed the industrial city of Ust-Kamenogorsk 

A newly discovered secret report shows 638 people were hospitalised

Over 100,000 people were exposed and birth defects are still common today

By Tim Collins For Mailonline

A newly unearthed secret report commissioned during the Cold War has brought to light the devastating effects of Russian nuclear testing.

During the 1950s, one detonation in Kazakhstan resulted in four times the number of cases of acute radiation sickness than those from the Chernobyl disaster.

More than 600 people ended up in hospital and at least 100,000 people are believed to have been affected by the explosion.

And children are still being born today with defects resulting from the fallout.

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Scientists from the Institute of Biophysics in Moscow have uncovered a secret Soviet report. It records the effects of the fallout from nuclear weapons test at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, which resulted in four times the number of cases of radiation sickness than Chernobyl 

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Scientists from the Institute of Biophysics in Moscow have uncovered a secret Soviet report. It records the effects of the fallout from nuclear weapons test at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, which resulted in four times the number of cases of radiation sickness than Chernobyl

SEMIPALATINSK

Between 1949 and 1989 some 456 nuclear tests were carried out here, 340 underground and 116 in the atmosphere.

In August 1956, fallout engulfed the industrial city of Ust-Kamenogorsk.

The new report shows that 638 people were hospitalised with radiation poisoning in the city – more than four times the 134 radiation cases diagnosed after the Chernobyl accident.

It is unclear how many died.

Towns and villages across of eastern Kazakhstan were all affected by the fallout.

A special clinic – under the control of Moscow – was set up to track radiation and its health effects in the area.

It eventually had a register of 100,000 people exposed to the tests and their children.

In August 1956, fallout from a Soviet nuclear weapons test at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan engulfed the industrial city of Ust-Kamenogorsk over 100 miles (175 km) away.

Semipalatinsk, which is now called Semey, was the primary testing ground for the Soviet Union’s nuclear weapons.

A newly uncovered report by New Scientist reveals that a scientific expedition was sent out to the region from Moscow just after the explosion.

It uncovered widespread radioactive contamination and radiation sickness across the Kazakh Steppe, a vast area of open grasslands in the north of the country.

The scientists then tracked the ongoing consequences as Soviet nuclear bomb tests continued – without telling the people affected or the outside world.

The report into the effects of those tests has remained a secret – until now.

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