Paul
Goble
Staunton, July 9 – Russia has
suffered more than 30,000 deaths from the coronavirus, with their number
growing by 600 a day, not the just over 10,000 total and 200 daily deaths the
Kremlin claims, Aleksey Raksha says. The Kremlin has been given accurate figures
by Rosstat, but nonetheless continues to lie about them (svoboda.org/a/30716193.html).
The Russian demographer worked at
the State Statistical Agency but got into trouble after telling the New York
Times that 70 percent of Covid-19 cases in Moscow were not reflected in
official statistics. He is now out of a job there (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/07/demographer-who-told-nytimes-70-percent.html).
Raksha provided the accurate mortality
figures in the course of an enormous interview given to Radio Liberty and
documented the ways in which the Russian government has ignored the actual
numbers in order to present itself to the Russian people and the world as more successful
in combatting the pandemic than other countries.
Raksha’s revelations were not the
only ones today that called into question what the Russian government has been
saying. Virusologist Aleksandr
Chepurnov, who earlier headed the Vector Laboratory which worked on especially
dangerous diseases, said that no vaccine was going to end the pandemic on its
own (ura.news/news/1052440068).
What has to happen is to end the
transfer of the virus from one person to another by self-isolation, social distancing
or wearing masks. The development of herd immunity will help but will take a
long time to reach. And those like Russia’s rulers who expect any vaccine to be
a magic bullet are only deluding themselves and others.
While many in the West are still
inclined to accept Moscow’s figures, reporting them as if they were equivalent
to those in other countries, few Russians do. A new survey by the Russian
Academy of Economics and State Service found that only 13 percent of Russians
believe the numbers the Kremlin is putting out (finanz.ru/novosti/aktsii/dve-treti-rossiyan-ne-veryat-oficialnoy-statistike-po-koronavirusu-1029375867).
The official figures nonetheless
continue to appear and must be reported as an indication of what the powers
that be in Russia want their people and others to believe. In the last 24
hours, there were 6509 more cases of infection, bringing the cumulative total
to 707,301, and 176 more deaths, pushing
that total up to 10,843 (t.me/COVID2019_official/995).
The pandemic in Russia continues to
ease in some places and worsen in others. Moscow today saw the smallest number
of new cases since April (ekhokavkaza.com/a/30715838.html);
and as a result, Mayor Sergey Sobyanin announced that masks will not be
required after next week and that most stores and public facilities will reopen
(https://www.sobyanin.ru/otmena-ogranicheniy-obrazovanie-i-detskie-tsentry).
Moscow officials have proposed that
flights to 13 countries, nine in the EU and four in Asia, resume soon (rbc.ru/business/09/07/2020/5f06d7009a79476fdd076d3c).
Tajikistan ended charter flights home for immigrants in Russia (stanradar.com/news/full/40328-posolstvo-tadzhikistana-prekratilo-zapis-na-vyvoznye-chartery-kak-migrantam-vernutsja-domoj.html), and Kabardino-Balkaria reopened its hotels,
resorts and sports facilities (doshdu.com/v-kbr-razreshat-rabotu-gostinic-pansionatov-i-sportivnyh-obektov/).
But elsewhere, there are problems,
none worse than in the country’s penal system where many inmates have come down
with the virus and are not receiving adequate medical care. They are not so
isolated that these spikes won’t affect other Russians in the larger community
(newsru.com/russia/09jul2020/jailcovid.html).
If the news about the pandemic was
variegated, that about the economy was uniformly bad with a single possible
exception. Incomes and employment continue to fall, but Russian workers are
complaining less about being owed back pay (levada.ru/2020/07/09/ozhidaniya-i-povedenie-v-sfere-zanyatosti-i-potrebleniya/).
Businesses believe that the economy
will continue to decline well beyond the end of this year (vedomosti.ru/opinion/articles/2020/07/09/834222-predprinimateli-gotovyatsya),
and declining incomes mean that regional budgets are being hit ever harder,
leaving many in a precarious position (rosbalt.ru/moscow/2020/07/09/1852873.html).
Bank profits are projected to
decline by 50 percent by the end of the year (krizis-kopilka.ru/archives/78038).
The processing sector of the economy is also showing continuing declines (krizis-kopilka.ru/archives/78028).
And wholesale prices for electricity have fallen, reflecting declining demand (kommersant.ru/doc/4408370).
Meanwhile,
in other pandemic-related news from Russia,
·
The government announced that vaccination
against the coronavirus, once that medicine becomes available, will be
voluntary (capost.media/news/obshchestvo/mikhail-murashko-vaccination-against-coronavirus-is-voluntary/).
·
Unemployment
is so high in Daghestan that young men are ignoring the risks of going through
the spring draft so that they can get the military ticket that will open the
way for them to be employed in the security sector (etokavkaz.ru/obshchestvo/ne-na-voinu-provozhayu-kak-prizyvayut-v-armiyu-kogda-vokrug-koronavirus).
·
Russians
who live in major cities have become more concerned about the virus over the
last two months and thus more ready to wear masks and follow social distancing,
a new Russian Academy of Economics and State Service survey finds (vedomosti.ru/opinion/articles/2020/07/09/834221-zhiteli-krupnih-gorodov-osoznali-realnost).
·
Ever
more Russians are turning to the Internet to do their shopping. Now, one in
three does so (krizis-kopilka.ru/archives/78041).
·
A
Samara clothing line has put out masks with ethnic symbols on them (nazaccent.ru/content/33576-v-samare-prezentovali-kollekciyu-masok-s.html).
·
And
doctors say they do not want to engage in distance diagnosing, something a new
Russian law allows but that many medical specialists leads to incorrect
diagnosis and treatment (https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/4408029).
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