Moscow’s Pandemic Statistics ‘Fairytales for Useful Idiots,’ Eidman Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 2 – As the number of reported new coronavirus infections in Russia has shot up by nearly 10,000 in the last 24 hours bringing the total there to more than 120,000 while the number of deaths from the pandemic has gone up far more slowly, it has become obvious, Igor Eidman says, that Russian statistics are “a fairytale for useful idiots.”

            The Kremlin has decided that the number of infected can be reported but the number of deaths still can’t, the Russian sociologist says. It needs the low death rates to show itself as a success in fighting the virus both at home and abroad where it is certain “useful idiots” will say this shows Putin is doing a better job than are Western leaders (facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=3116454525084172&id=100001589654713).

            Given the willingness of international media outlets to rely on official statistics despite their obvious limitations – many cases aren’t reported because the victims don’t go to the hospital or doctors misidentify the causes or because tests are given to only a few and are themselves unreliable – the Kremlin’s calculation is likely correct, Eidman says.

            But this reliance on unreliable statistics comes with a cost: “liars over time begin to believe their own lies. [Moscow Mayor] Sobyanin certainly really believes that the situation in Russia is ‘following the European variant.’” In fact, the sociologist continues, there is growing evidence that the pandemic in Russia is proceeding along a much worse trajectory. 

            Sergey Sobyanin himself suggests that the actual number of infected in his city has reached two percent (novayagazeta.ru/news/2020/05/02/161181-sobyanin-koronavirusom-zarazilis-okolo-2-zhiteley-moskvy), likely an understatement but far higher than the central Russian government is reporting.

            That this is the case is suggested by his statement that if the numbers do go up as they are likely do, the mayor will have no compunction about ordering a dramatic reduction in the number of electronic passes so that Muscovites will be more tightly confined to their homes (sobkorr.org/news/5EAD42A1CF959.html).

            Meanwhile, health officials are explaining away the dramatic rise in infections in Moscow by saying that as more people are tested, the results from those tests will be coming in faster than the number of new cases will increase, possibly but not certainly the case (rbc.ru/rbcfreenews/5ead5ba99a79473f8983cd8d?from=from_main).

            That is particularly likely because other Russian officials concede that no more than 60 percent of the results of these tests are accurate, with some tests showing false positives and others false negatives, making the figures being reported problematic (znak.com/2020-05-02/popova_zayavila_chto_v_nekotoryh_laboratoriyah_60_testov_na_covid_19_nedostoverny and nakanune.ru/news/2020/5/2/22572700/).

            And at the gas field in Sakha where workers rose in protest, the latest figures show than a third of all employees there are infected with few receiving adequate treatment and so deaths are likely to rise (novayagazeta.ru/news/2020/05/02/161189-v-yakutii-tret-rabochih-chayandinskogo-mestorozhdeniya-zarazilas-koronavirusom).

            While the numbers of infected and dead from the pandemic are growing so to is anger at the Putin’s regime’s approach, with some viewing it as too little and too late but far more saying that the self-isolation campaign is excessive and more about political control than about fighting the epidemic (thinktanks.by/publication/2020/05/02/opros-48-protsentov-rossiyan-ne-odobryayut-antivirusnye-mery-putina.html).

            Such attitudes are leading not only to increased anger at the powers but also to open sabotage of the counter-pandemic measures that have been taken, regionalist historian Andrey Degtyanov says, with people massively violating the stay at home orders the authorities have issued (region.expert/sabotage/).

            In addition, more Russians are taking part in organized protests both online and in the streets, and since yesterday, with the onset of the spring holidays, many are fleeing to their dachas where the restrictions are less onerous. For the Kremlin, the violation of its orders is an even greater threat than the pandemic.

            Indeed, Degtyanov says, the attempt to force Russians to stay home to fight the coronavirus has done more to mobilize the population against the regime than the actions of the opposition over the last 20 years. People see that the walls the regime has erected rest on sand. What they will do next remains to be seen.

            And in yet another action likely to be ignored but that calls into question the Kremlin’s oft-proclaimed commitment to humanitarian assistance, Moscow has sent the US a bill for “almost 660,000 dollars” for the shipment it made of medical equipment to help Washington fight the pandemic (ehorussia.com/new/node/20716).