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Healthcare development in the former Soviet Union

Lessons to learn in both directions

A journey on the Moscow Metro is a rich and mixed experience. The trains are efficient, and many of the stations provide staggering examples celebrating Russian design and architecture across the centuries. At Ploschad Revolyutsil station, bronze statues adorn each corner and alcove. They pay homage to the great ideals of Soviet society; the collective farmworker, the soldier, the athlete, the proud mother of a small healthy family. A search for the depiction of those who care for the sick will be largely unsuccessful. Even in the medical and nursing schools the pictorial displays (mercifully now fading and being cleared away) are of triumphant performances of medically supported troops on the battlefield, as opposed to the care of those who are medically ill.

The Soviet system favoured closely monitored good health from cradle to grave. From the polyclinic (a kind of health centre, each one serving a few thousand people) to the Prikaz (a massive protocol driven tome) the emphasis was on being well and staying well. Collective life meant that the funding and construction of buildings was never a major problem. There emerged in each town …