Two Million Russians Suffer from Psychological Disorders, Serbsky Institute Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 3 – The Serbsky Institute, which became notorious in Soviet times for its diagnosis of dissidents as suffering from “creeping schizophrenia,” says that two million Russians (2,000,647) have been diagnosed as suffering from non-psychotic psychological disorders.

            Boris Kazakovtsev, a specialist at that institute, says that these disorders are primarily the result of environmental factors and may emerge as a result of “family life, unemployment, alcoholism,” stress, or from physical damage to the brain (russian.rt.com/russia/news/607470-samye-rasprostranyonnye-psihicheskie-rasstroistva).

            He and his colleagues include in this category the mentally retarded, with some 862,176 people in that category as well as dementia, with 1,097,909 listed as having that problem.  The remainder are people, often young or middle aged, who display behavioral problems that they cannot control without treatment.

            Last year, the Bekhterev Institute reported that over the last seven years, the number of Russians suffering psychological disorders had declined, a trend the Serbsky Institute says is continuing (russian.rt.com/russia/news/532829-psihicheskie-rasstroistva-snizhenie-zabolevaemosti). Whether that reflects a real decline or a decline in the number diagnosed is unclear. 

            The latter is a real possibility given the sharp reduction in the number of hospitals and medical offices in rural Russia as a result of Vladimir Putin’s “optimization” program, a money-saving effort that has left all too many Russians without the medical care they need. It has, however, allowed the government to claim improvements where there haven’t been any.