Paul Goble
Staunton, Nov. 4 – Even before Moscow announced that it would mobilize up to 3,000 medical personnel to support its military campaign in Ukraine, doctors and other medical professionals began to flee the country in order to avoid such a fate, with large numbers going to Kazakhstan.
According to one study, Russia as a result now faces shortages in the number of surgeons, neurologists, anesthesiologists, therapists and pediatricians as well of a nurses and other medical support personnel (kommersant.ru/doc/5633364 and verstka.media/vrachi-medsestry-feldshery-pokidayut-stranu).
And that is making it even more difficult for ordinary Russians to get the medical treatment they need, perhaps one of the most significant consequences of Putin’s war in Ukraine for many and likely a source of growing anger as the war continues into its tenth month with little sign it will end.
In Kazakhstan, hospitals and clinics are more than happy to welcome Russian medical professionals given that they are understaffed; and Russian doctors and nurses are finding it easy to make the move. They don’t want to go to war, and they are relatively “apolitical,” observers say, making it easy for them to work outside of Russia.
What is most worrisome for the future of Russian healthcare is that younger specialists dominate the flow. Most older doctors and nurses find it more difficult to leave, but their potential replacements are disappearing, yet another way the war is coming home to Russians in ways that few can escape.
As one medical professional who has fled says, “if someone attacked our country, I would remain and provide the needed medical help. But in this case, our country is the aggressor; We have attacked another country. And what should be defending in this situation? What help should we provide? That is why we have left.”
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