| 1. |
- McKee, M, et al.
(författare)
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Access to water in the countries of the former Soviet Union
- 2006
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Ingår i: Public Health. - : Elsevier BV. - 0033-3506 .- 1476-5616. ; 120:4, s. 364-372
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: During the Soviet period, authorities in the USSR invested heavily in collective farming and modernization of living conditions in rural areas. However, many problems remained, including poor access to many basic amenities such as water. Since then, the situation is likely to have changed; economic decline has coincided with migration and widening social inequalities, potentially increasing disparities within and between countries. Aim: To examine access to water and sanitation and its determinants in urban and rural areas of eight former Soviet countries. Methods: A series of nationally representative surveys in Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Ukraine was undertaken in 2001, covering 18,428 individuals (aged 18+ years). Results: The percentage of respondents Living in rural areas varied between 27 and 59% among countries. There are wide urban-rural differences in access to amenities. Even in urban areas, only about 90% of respondents had access to cold running water in their home (60% in Kyrgyzstan). In rural areas, less than one-third had cold running water in their homes (44% in Russia, under 10% in Kyrgyzstan and Moldova). Between one-third and one-half of rural respondents in some countries (such as Belarus, Kazakhstan and Moldova) obtained their water from welts and similar sources. Access to hot running water inside the homes was an exception in rural households, reflecting the tack of modern heating methods in villages. Similarly, indoor access to toilets is common in urban areas but rare in rural areas. Access to all amenities was better in Russia compared with elsewhere in the region. Indoor access to cold water was significantly more common among rural residents Living in apartments, and in settlements served by asphalt roads rather than dirt roads. People with more assets or income and living with other people were significantly more likely to have water on tap. In addition, people who had moved in more recently were more likely to have an indoor water supply. Conclusions: This was the largest single study of its kind undertaken in this region, and demonstrates that a significant number of people living in rural parts of the former Soviet Union do not have indoor access to running water and sanitation. There are significant variations among countries, with the worse situation in central Asia and the Caucasus, and the best situation in Russia. Access to water strongly correlates with socio-economic characteristics. These findings suggest a need for sustained investment in rebuilding basic infrastructure in the region, and monitoring the impact of living conditions on health.
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| 2. |
- Mäkinen, Ilkka Henrik, et al.
(författare)
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Suicide Mortality and Agricultural Rationalization in Post-War Europe
- 2006
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Ingår i: Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0933-7954 .- 1433-9285. ; 41:6, s. 429-434
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background The relationship between agricultural rationalization and suicide mortality has been little researched. On the basis of the hypothesis that agricultural rationalization leads to more suicide, this study investigated whether a general relationship could be found between structural change in agriculture and suicide mortality in post-war Europe. Method Due to the expected small size of the effect, the data were deliberately collected so as to maximize the variation in the independent variable. Annual national-level data on suicide mortality, the percentage of the work force in agricultural employment, and the unemployment level were collected from those countries and 10-year periods where the structural changes (reductions in employment) in agriculture between 1950 and 1995 had been most and least pronounced. In order to avoid confounders, the annual changes in the variables’ values were correlated with each other, adding a control for the level of unemployment, and allowing for lagged effects. Results The annual changes in the levels of agricultural employment and those of suicide mortality did not covary at all. Controlling for unemployment levels did not change this, nor could any lagged effects be found. Conclusions At the most general level, no causal relation between agricultural rationalization and suicide mortality was detected. This lack of a universal relation does not, however, preclude the possibility of the relationship existing given certain socio-historical circumstances.
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| 3. |
- Razvodovsky, Y, et al.
(författare)
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Suicide in urban and rural regions of Belarus, 1990-2005
- 2009
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Ingår i: Public Health. - : Elsevier BV. - 0033-3506 .- 1476-5616. ; 123:1, s. 27-31
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objective: To examine the occurrence of suicide in urban and rural regions of Belarus in the post-Soviet Period. Study design: Unlinked cross-sectional study using data drawn from four time points. Methods: Age- and gender-specific suicide data for urban and rural regions of Belarus were obtained from the Belarus Ministry of Statistics for the years 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2005. The data were recalculated into seven age categories and then directly standardized. Poisson regression models were used to assess changes ill urban-rural suicide rate ratios across the four time points. Results: Between 1990 and 2000, the suicide rate rose sharply in Belarus. It started to reduce after 2000, but in 2005 it was still much higher than its initial level. The same was true for urban and rural suicide rates and for male Suicide rates in all regions combined. However, after 1995, there was a divergence between gender-specific rates in urban and rural areas. A small reduction in urban suicide rates for both genders contrasted with a sharp increase in suicide rates among trien and women in rural areas. By 2005, although suicide rates had fallen from their 2000 level for both genders in urban and rural locations, the decrease was much smaller in rural areas. These changes resulted in a deteriorating rural-urban suicide ratio across the period 1990-2005, with suicide rates among nearly every rural male age group remaining extreme after 1995. Although it is probable that a deteriorating social and economic situation has underpinned increasing suicide rates in all regions, there may be factors that are specific to rural locations, such as increasing social isolation and poor provision of medical services, that account for the extreme suicide rates now being recorded there. Conclusion: By 2005, Belarus had one of the highest suicide rates in the world. This now requires urgent intervention by the necessary authorities to ameliorate this situation in urban and, especially, rural locations.
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| 6. |
- Stickley, Andrew, et al.
(författare)
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Alcohol and Homicide in Early Twentieth Century Russia
- 2005
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Ingår i: Contemporary Drug Problems. - 0091-4509 .- 2163-1808. ; 32, s. 501-523
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Tidskriftsartikel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Description Since the publication of Leon et al.'s (1997) seminal study, alcohol has been increasingly recognized as an important factor in Russian excess mortality during the transition period (Nemtsov, 2002). Besides its more obvious contribution in the form of alcohol poisonings, liver cirrhoses, and alcoholic psychoses (Reitan, 2000), it has also been linked to cardiovascular mortality (McKee, Shkolnikov & Leon, 2001; Shkolnikov, McKee & Leon, 2001) and to deaths due to external causes (Shkolnikov & Mesle, 1996). In particular, it has been associated with homicide. In the period 1965-1984 a connection was observed between these two phenomena at the aggregate level in Russia (Nemtsov, 2001). Although this seems to have become somewhat weaker as other factors, such as the rise of a new criminal elite, have become important for homicide during the transition period (Nemtsov, 2001), alcohol nevertheless continues to play an important role in violent mortality in contemporary Russia (Pridemore, 2002a). Indeed, up to 80% of all homicide offenders may be intoxicated at the time the offense is committed (Chervyakov et al., 2002). This connection between alcohol and homicide in Russia is not new. Although during the Soviet period statistics relating to all "unacceptable" causes of death, including homicide, were withheld by the authorities (Pridemore, 2001), Soviet criminologists using smaller samples were nonetheless able to highlight the existence of this relationship while discussing the nature of homicide more generally. Research from the 1960s showed that between two-thirds and three-quarters of all intentional homicides involved alcohol (Connor, 1973; Shelley, 1987), although there were large interregional variations that may have had a "cultural" component underlying them--i.e., where alcohol consumption levels were lower among certain populations, such as the Moslem groups of the Caucasus region (Connor, 1973). For Russia this figure (74%) remained constant until the end of the Soviet period, according to court statistics (White, 1996). Despite the presence of this relationship during the second half of the 20th century, it would be premature to conclude that this was merely a Soviet phenomenon that continued into the post-communist period. The detrimental effects of alcohol on morbidity and mortality in Russia were fully understood by the first decade of the 20th century (White, 1996). During this period increased levels of drunkenness were also blamed for the rising levels of violent criminality in both the city and the countryside (Snow, 1987; Neuberger, 1993; Frank, 1999). This may explain why statistics relating to the state (sober/inebriated) in which offenders committed criminal acts were recorded by the judicial authorities from 1904 onwards. Even while arguing that the quality of these statistics was less than ideal, Tarnovskii (1908) nonetheless suggested that there was a connection between alcohol consumption and homicide. (1) Alcohol was also argued to be a factor behind the increase in certain motives underlying homicide during the early part of the 20th century (1901-1910) (Mel'nikov, 1917) which included the "revolutionary years" 1905-1907, when a large increase in the number of homicides was observed (Gernet, 1974; Ostroumov, 1980). Study aim This study aims to extend the existing research on the relationship between alcohol and homicide in the Soviet and post-Soviet periods by using vital statistics to examine this relationship statistically in the latter years of the tsarist regime, 1909-1911. This was one of the most turbulent periods in Russian history. The rapid industrial advance that began in the last decade of the 19th century (Falkus, 1972) had its corollary in increasing levels of urbanization as thousands of peasants flocked into the largest cities (Bater, 1996). The social and structural changes created by this process were being exacerbated by the dislocations still being felt from the defeat in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) and the 1905 Revolution. Moreover, change was occurring not only in the cities. Prime Minister Stolypin's attempt (1906) to alter the structure of the Russian countryside by creating a class of landowning peasants was helping turn peasants against one another (Mel'nikov, 1917). In relation to this, it is important to examine whether these factors had any impact themselves on homicide rates. After consulting contemporary criminological literature (Messner & Rosenfeld, 1999; Pridemore, 2002b) and historical studies of the correlates of crime in other societies (Lodhi & Tilly, 1973; McHale & Johnson, 1976; Zehr, 1976), several structural variables were used as controls and were adjusted for in the analysis of the relationship between alcohol consumption and homicide (Table 2). Most of these variables fall within what has been termed "social disorganization theory" in the criminological literature. This theory has its roots in the writings of people such as Tonnies and Durkheim, who suggested that as the processes of urbanization and modernization occurred, the bonds once holding traditional communities together were broken. Factors such as higher levels of residential mobility, greater population densities, and ethnic heterogeneity are all now argued to result in less integration and increased societal disorganization. In these conditions weakened social control allows both crime and violence to grow (Pridemore, 2002b). It should also be noted, however, that despite the abovementioned changes, at this time Russia still remained very much a rural society. If a relationship between alcohol and homicide can therefore be identified in this earlier period, when Russian society was very different from the way it is today, this would suggest that other factors, apart from, for example, the effects of large-scale urbanization and industrialization in the Soviet years, or social shock and societal disorganization in the transition period, might have been important in linking alcohol and homicide in Russia across the course of the 20th century. Data and methodology Data Homicide Unlike the earlier research conducted in tsarist Russia, which used judicial statistics, this article makes use of the vital statistics data on homicide. Data for the years 1909-1911 were drawn from the Report on the State of Public Health (Otchet o sostoyanii narodnago zdraviya), a publication issued annually by the directorate of the chief medical inspector of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Upravlenie glavnogo vrachebnago inspektora M. V. D.). It contained information about the total number of homicides (i.e., corpses where a forensic-medical examination had determined homicide as the cause of death) in the provinces of the Russian Empire. It also contained regional population data that allowed crude homicide rates to be calculated for each region. Although the quality of medical data from this period has been criticized as being somewhat rudimentary (Novosel'skii, 1916), we have no evidence that it was either deliberately or systematically distorted. A homicide rate for each study region was created from these data by dividing the...
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| 7. |
- Stickley, Andrew, et al.
(författare)
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Alcohol mortality in Russia : A historical perspective
- 2009
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Ingår i: Public Health. - : Elsevier BV. - 0033-3506 .- 1476-5616. ; 123:1, s. 20-26
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Objective: To examine major changes in the supply of alcohol in Russia and its impact on health in late-tsarist and early-Soviet society. Study design and methods: Statistical data on acute forms of alcohol mortality were drawn from official publications and medical literature published in the period 1860-1930 that covered the 50 provinces of European Russia and some of the major cities in the Russian Empire. These data were examined for across-time changes in alcohol mortality in relation to changes in the availability of alcohol products, both in terms of increased and decreased levels of supply. Results: Rapid changes in the supply of alcoholic products in earlier periods of Russian history resulted in quick and marked changes in the levels of acute alcohol mortality. However, while restrictions on the availability of spirits have sometimes been effective in reducing alcohol mortality, there has often been a rapid recourse to alternative forms of alcohol, i.e. alcohol surrogates. Conclusion: The lesson of history suggests that any attempt to deal with the problem of hazardous drinking in Russia must deal with all sources of alcohol, both legal and illegal, as individuals have demonstrated a high degree of ingenuity in identifying alternative sources of alcohol, both in the past and the present.
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| 8. |
- Stickley, Andrew, et al.
(författare)
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Alcohol Poisoning in Belarus : A Comparison of Urban-Rural Trends, 1990-2005
- 2009
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Ingår i: Alcohol and Alcoholism. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 0735-0414 .- 1464-3502. ; 44:3, s. 326-331
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the occurrence of alcohol poisoning in urban and rural regions of Belarus in the post-Soviet period. Methods: All-age male and female alcohol-poisoning mortality and population data were obtained for the years 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2005 for urban and rural regions of Belarus. These data were subsequently recalculated into three age categories and directly standardized. Poisson regression models were used to assess relative changes in rural-urban alcohol-poisoning rates across time. Results: Although extremely high in comparative terms in 1990, alcohol-poisoning rates had nevertheless risen considerably amongst men and women in all age groups in both urban and rural regions by 2005. In rural regions, the rise was continuous while amongst the urban population a small reduction was recorded in 2000 after a comparatively larger rise in 1995. By 2005, although alcohol-poisoning rates were significantly higher amongst rural men and women, the levels of acute alcohol mortality were nevertheless extremely high in nearly every age group in both urban and rural locations. Conclusions: It is probable that both the level and pattern of alcohol consumption in conjunction with the increasing use of illegal alcohol underlie the extremely high alcohol-poisoning rates in contemporary Belarus, and the growing rural-urban divergence in alcohol-poisoning mortality observed in recent years. Immediate action is now required to improve the poor social and economic conditions underpinning extreme levels of acute alcohol mortality, as well as to increase the provision of alcohol treatment services, especially in rural areas.
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| 9. |
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| 10. |
- Stickley, Andrew, et al.
(författare)
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Attitudes Toward Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in Moscow
- 2008
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Ingår i: Journal of family Violence. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0885-7482 .- 1573-2851. ; 23, s. 447-456
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study examines attitudes towards violenceagainst women among the populace in Moscow, Russiausing data drawn from the Moscow Health Survey.Information was obtained from 1,190 subjects (510 menand 680 women) about their perceptions of whetherviolence against women was a serious problem in contemporaryRussia, and under what circumstances they thoughtit was justifiable for a husband to hit his wife. Less thanhalf the respondents thought violence was a seriousproblem, while for a small number of interviewees therewere several scenarios where violence was regarded asbeing permissible against a wife. Being young, divorced orwidowed, having financial difficulties, and regularly consumingalcohol were associated with attitudes moresupportive of violence amongst men; having a loweducational level underpinned supportive attitudes amongboth men and women. Results are discussed in terms of the public reemergence of patriarchal attitudes in Russia in thepost-Soviet period.
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