As Alcohol Prices Rise and Restrictions on Its Sale Increase, Russians Turning to Dangerous Surrogates

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 27 – The rising death toll from the consumption of alcohol surrogates in Leningrad Oblast, where more than 30 people have died so far, is calling attention to a serious problem that Moscow faces whenever it tries to reduce the still high level of consumption of alcoholic beverages in that country.

            Whenever the price of government-regulated alcohol goes up either as a result of inflation or increased taxation, Russians turn to what they call surrogates, either alcohol contaminated by other fluids or other fluids that contain alcohol but are not supposed to be consumed by human beings.

            The Russian government historically has not counted the consumption of these alternatives in its reports about alcohol consumption so as to make the situation appear better than it is. But consumption of surrogates is now surging and thus total alcohol consumption per capita in Russia is likely to be as high or higher than it ever war.

            What makes this situation even worse is that the surrogates including adulterated alcoholic products contain poisons that make seriously ill or even kill those who use them, while the government’s failure to count what experts have long pointed to means that this problem attracts widespread attention only when it hits a large city.

            For details on the Leningrad case, see ura.news/news/1053001991 and ura.news/news/1053001864; for background on surrogates and how Russian policies have contributed to increased consumption of them, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2017/12/russians-arent-drinking-less-theyre.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/07/in-seeking-to-reduce-alcoholism-in.html and https://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/10/one-fifth-of-all-alcohol-russians-now.html.