suddenly thrown into battle

**The following blog post was written in May of 2020, but due to COVID-19 was not published until July 2020.

As March and April progressed, it seemed that Russia was one of the few places nearly untouched by COVID-19. That has changed this past May. The country now has 232,243 confirmed cases, and, as of the week of May 10th, has been registering 10,000 new cases a day. 

Health workers are bearing the brunt of these new cases. Many have turned to social media, sharing their fear and exposing their lack of protective resources. 200 medics are being treated in one St. Petersburg hospital, and 2,000 are reported to be ill with COVID-19 in Moscow. This has led to a decreased number of qualified workers. 

Andrey Konoval, the head of the independent health union, Dyeistviye, has announced that Russia health workers are “on the threshold simply of a collapse in health personnel.” In Moscow, hospitals have begun to bring in medical students to assist with the influx of patients. These students have compared themselves to military recruits suddenly thrown into battle, without even knowing how to shoot.  

In addition to having insufficient supplies and, in some cases, training, medical workers have also felt unsupported and even attacked by the government. In Bashkortostan, in central Russia, for example, Governor Radii Khabirov chastised doctors for speaking out about their insufficient protective equipment, and claimed that the government could provide what they were lacking. He said that their cries for help were shameful. The president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, has also acknowledged that, despite earlier promises, only half of Russia’s health workers have been paid bonuses for their exhausting work on the frontlines.

At least 169 health workers have died from COVID-19, and even more have died from different but related causes. Three health workers have fallen from hospital windows, and the cause of their falls have been unclear, because these are workers who previously spoke out against the government. Two of these workers have died, and one remains in critical condition. 

Moscow, Russia’s capital, is bracing for the flow of critically ill patients. Temporary coronavirus hospitals have been set up across the city, including the transformation of a historical Soviet-era pavilion and a nearby suburban mall into spaces lined with beds for future COVID-19 patients. Despite this, officials say they are hopeful that the spread of the virus is stabilizing, and phase one of reopening has begun this month across the country.