I don’t believe in high death toll either. It is mostly green propaganda. Plant workers, first responders and a few leaders and participant of the cleanup operation who spent too much time there are only confirmed fatalities. Maybe a couple hundred people developed cancer as a result but it is really hard to establish a link between illness and the event. No statistics indicates there is a spike in cancer cases between before and after the event.
Another thing is after the government stopped enforcing the zone hundreds of people returned to their homes. Many still live there after almost 30 years and 90+ years old.
I’’ve seen reports of 4000 cases of childhood thyroid cancer, which would be expected to be the most common early cancer. BUT same reports showed only 7 cases were fatal!