The Early Stages of the Epidemiological Transition in Russia

Historical researches help to understand modern time better. The modern Russian structure of death causes is disadvantageous in comparison with the European countries. Modernization of mortality in Russia had lagging character, successes were achieved through borrowed technologies but society was not perceived them, this slowed down the modernization. The contradiction of “technology / mass consciousness” was not eliminated, and made itself felt in the following decades. A significant gap in life expectancy with the European countries of Russia was reduced in the 1960s, but a new lagging began almost immediately, that continues today. There is a theory of epidemiological transition in demography, according to which mortality, mainly from external causes, replaced by mortality from internal, degenerative causes, so life expectancy is growing. The first stage of epidemiological transition began in the end of 18th century in Europe. Until the end of the 19th century, Russia lagged behind European states in life expectancy due to the high level of infant mortality. The epidemiological transition has many factors, therefore ethnographic studies, statistical, historical, cultural and medical information are used in the work. The peculiarity of the early stages of the epidemiological transition in Russia is its intermittent nature. Another feature is the late onset of the overall modernization of the country in comparison with Europe. Early stages of the epidemiological transition in Russia: the pre-revolutionary (discussion of the device of medical care for the entire population, the development of zemstvo medicine, the fight against popular ignorance), 1861-1917; soviet (the creation of a centralized healthcare system, a short-term increase in life expectancy, demographic stagnation), 1922-1941.