Infant Mortality Rate On Decline In Russia

 

The infant mortality rate is sharply on the decline in Russia. The infant mortality rate has reduced by 23% for the first quarter of 2009 as compared with the same period in 2008, specialists of the Russian Ministry of Health and Social Development cited this statistical data on occasion of International Children's Day celebrated worldwide on June 1. "The infant mortality rate in January-April 2009 has made 87.1% down to the level for the period from January to April 2008," the ministry said.

 

For the first three months of 2009 "the number of babies born alive amounted to 564,662" that is 3.2% more than for the same period in the previous year, the ministry said.

 

The Ministry of Health and Social Development believes that all this is the result of the work under the national project and notes "the importance of the complex approach" - regular medical examinations, treatment and rehabilitation courses. Medical examinations of newborns and children in the first year of life are particularly important, the specialists said.

 

The number of medical institutions, which provide the high-tech medical aid, is constantly on the rise in Russia. In 2008 there were 86 such institutions, and there expected to be 103 of high-tech medical institutions in 2009. These medical institutions are expected to give the medical aid to more than 41,000 children this year. These high-tech medical services concern oral surgery, the transplantation of organs and tissues, endocrinology and traumatic surgery. Most children receiving the high-tech medical aid have some disabilities.

 

Russian medics give close attention to regular medical examinations and treatment courses for orphans and children in trouble. About 350,000 children passed regular medical examinations in 2008. More than 130,000 of them were cured at outpatient clinics, about 40,000 children were brought to hospitals, about 4.2 thousand children received the high-tech medical aid, and about 1,000 children passed recuperation courses at sanatoria. This year even more children left without parental care will pass medical examinations, the Russian Ministry of Health and Social Development pledged.

 

Medvedev To Award Prolific Families With Order Of Parental Glory

 

Several Russian prolific families will be awarded with the Order of Parental Glory in the Kremlin on International Children's Day, which is celebrated on June 1 worldwide. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will hold an awarding ceremony, because he instituted this order and signed the relevant decree in the first days of his presidency.

 

The first awarding ceremony with the Order of Parental Glory was held on January 13, 2009. Medvedev conferred the order on the parents of seven large families then.

 

"The Order of Parental Glory will be bestowed already for the second time, and this awarding ceremony is timed to coincide with International Children's Day," press secretary of the Russian president Natalia Timakova told Itar-Tass. She recalled that on April 29 Medvedev introduced some amendments in the decree instituting the foresaid order. The amendments mainly concerned the statute of the order and its description.

 

As during the first awarding ceremony a prolific family will be awarded with the Order of Parental Glory, a 50,000-rouble reward and a certificate of merit. However, now each parent will also receive the sign of the order and its miniature copy for carrying on festive occasions. The sign of the order represents a blue cross with the national emblem in the middle at the red background.

 

Large families from all Russian regions arrived in Moscow so that the Russian president awarded them with the Order of Parental Glory. The laureates of this prize can be the parents having seven and more children.

 

For them the family is not only the main value, but also the main work.

 

"This tradition springing up in our country now - the awarding with the Order of Parental Glory should become a full-fledged tradition," Medvedev said at the awarding ceremony to the first laureates. "This is a special award, it is presented to the family and demonstrates the recognition of a great human contribution in the development of our society and heralds the state recognition of what you are doing at home," Medvedev pointed out.

 

"We will develop actively the measures of social support to maternity and childhood and will support the prestige of family values in every way," Medvedev pledged. "I believe all this will bring some results, and this is the particular results that are important most of all regardless the economic situation and the political situation," the president said with confidence.

 

In the Soviet times prolific families were awarded with the Medal of Maternity Honor and the Order of Maternity Glory, 3 degrees, and were presented with the title of Hero Mother. These awards and the title were instituted in September 1944. After the Soviet Union collapse prolific mothers were awarded with the Order of Friendship or the Medal of Merit for the Fatherland.

 

There are 50 million mothers from 76 million women in Russia, more than one million and 700,000 mothers have more than two children. Meanwhile, 34% of mothers bring up one child, 15% - two children, and only 3% of mothers are prolific, because they have three and more children. The specialists noted that for the pure reproduction of the population each Russian family should have two and more children. However, now each Russian woman has one child on average (except for the North Caucasus republics).

 

Smoking-related Death Rate Up 1-1/2 Times In Russia Over Past 20 Yrs - Experts

 

The number of deaths from smoking has increased in Russia time and a half over the past 20 years, resulting in almost four billion roubles worth of lost GDP in 2000 due to premature mortality of men aged 35-64, Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Protection and Welfare (Rospotrebnadzor) said.

 

Smoking in Russia is one of the most widely spread harmful habit. According to Rospotrebnadzor, 65 percent of men and up to 30 percent of women smoke. Of them, 80 percent of men and half of women started smoking in their teen years.

 

Over the past 20 years, the number of smokers in Russia increased by 440,000. "This happens mainly through the involvement of new social groups, such as young people and women," the service said.

 

Over three million teenagers smoke in Russia: 2.5 million boys and 500,000 girls. Tobacco smoking tends to spread among young people more rapidly. As a result, the number of smoking girls and young women grows considerably.

 

Specialists blame this situation on the fact that cigarette prices in Russia are among the lowest in the world. Even the most expensive cigarettes are 0.5-7 times cheaper than those sold in the European Union.

 

Rospotrebnadzor said, "Despite an increase in the nominal cigarette prices, they have been constantly dropping in real terms over the past six years."

 

About 400,000 people die from smoking in Russia annually.

 

The number of smokers continues to grow as more women and children take to smoking. Currently, the average age when a person starts smoking in Russia is 11 years. Mortality among Russian smokers is three times higher than abroad due to high tar and nicotine contents.

 

The State Duma Committee on Health plans to submit a draft law limiting tobacco consumption in Russia to the Duma before the end of this year.

 

The committee will also propose amendments to the Tax Code this autumn in a bid to raise cigarette excises, committee deputy chairman Nikolai Gerasimenko said.

 

"We have already presented the document at the parliamentary hearings. It was drafted together with the Ministry of Health and Social Development and Rospotrebnadzor," he said.

 

The document bans the sale of cigarettes except in stores, bans smoking in public places, and bans tobacco advertising. "We hope the draft law will be submitted to the State Duma this year," Gerasimenko said.

 

Earlier, the State Duma decided against passing amendments to the law that limits tobacco smoking in the country.

 

Gerasimenko said the decision had not been lobbied by tobacco companies. It's a legal norm: if an existing law is altered by more than a quarter, it is better to write a new one, he explained.

 

The Duma decided to draft a new law as a follow-up to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

 

Gerasimenko said the Duma would amend the federal law "On Tobacco Smoking" in order to increase health warnings on cigarette packs to 50 percent of their display area and introduce a total ban on tobacco advertising.

 

"The right to decide which bar or restaurant should allow smoking will be given to municipalities," he said.

 

Russia's chief sanitary inspector Gennady Onishchenko spoke flatly against a return of tobacco and beer advertisements to mass media.

 

"All this talk about a return of tobacco and beer advertising is not an indicator of the economy, but an indicator of responsibility of those who propose this," he said.

 

He does not share the view, expressed by some politicians, that such return would benefit the economy.

 

"Europe is also living through a financial crisis, but no one there is suggesting returning tobacco and beer advertisements because that would be the end of one's political and personal career," Onishchenko said.

 

The chief sanitary inspector spoke of the harmful effects of tobacco and alcohol consumption. He regretted that the technical regulation for tobacco products recently approved by the State Duma was not consistent with international standards and failed to meet safety requirements in respect to people's health.

 

Onishchenko is confident that the current version of the technical regulation was adopted by the Duma because of pressure from the tobacco lobby.

 

He specifically disagrees with some of the provisions. He believes that ostensibly harmless inscription "Smoking ages skin" needs to be replaced with a stronger health warning.

 

"There should be a picture showing cross-section of the lungs of a smoker who has died from lung cancer," he said.

 

The technical regulation calls for a gradual reduction of hazardous substances in tobacco products: for filter cigarettes: 10 milligrams of tar, 1 milligram of nicotine (current levels are 14 and 1.2 milligrams); and for non-filter cigarettes: 13 milligrams of tar and 1.1 milligrams of nicotine (current levels are 16 and 1.3 milligrams). These requirements will apply three years after the enactment of the law. Earlier, a five-year transitional period was planned, but it was reduced on the initiative of the pro-presidential United Russia party.

 

The document also says that every pack of cigarettes will have to bear the main health waning in a black frame, reading "Smoking kills". In addition, additional health warnings may be placed on a pack, such as "Smoking causes infarctions and insults", "Protect children from tobacco smoke" or "Consult your doctor in order to quit smoking".

 

Currently, the scale of tobacco smoking and the spread of tobacco-related diseases in Russia continue to grow. Despite the annual decrease in the population, cigarette consumption grows every year. From 2000 to 2005 cigarette consumption increased by 30 percent from 287 billion in 2000 to 375 billion in 2005. This causes serious damage to the health of the population since tobacco consumption is one of the main factors leading to the development of cardiovascular, bronchopulmonary and gastrointestinal diseases. For example, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the main cause of which is smoking, has risen in the structure of mortality in Russia over the past five years from 12th to 4th place. Lung cancer, which is caused by smoking in 90 percent of cases, affects about 50,000 men annually.

 

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Source: Itar-Tass