‘A death sentence’: Russia’s most vulnerable prepare for coronavirus assault

Thirty-six year old Ilya is a recovering heroin addict with an unenviable cocktail of adversaries: HIV; hepatitis B; hepatitis C; suspicious bank managers; prejudiced employers. Now he finds himself facing an unexpected new opponent — coronavirus — and it, he says, is the thing he fears most.

“Neither the government nor society gives a damn about us or our illnesses,” says Ilya, who asked for his surname to be withheld. “This virus gives them the perfect opportunity to get rid once and for all.”

Ilya is not alone in predicting Covid-19 will be left to spread quickly through Russia’s least resistant populations: the poor, infirm, homeless and disabled.

Twenty years into Vladimir Putin’s reign, the largest country in the world remains one of its most unequal. Ninety-eight of the world’s dollar billionaires are Russian. And yet 12.5 per cent of the population live on a below-poverty income of less than £110 a month. Undermined and underfunded, the country’s skeleton welfare system systematically limits the health and life chances of huge sections of the population.

These underlying injustices will be exacerbated in times of crisis. Maxim Malyshev, an activist of the Andrei Rylkov foundation that represents disadvantaged, drug-using Russians, says coronavirus infections would represent a “death sentence” for many of the people he works with. He explains: “All of our people fall into the known risk categories: HIV, weakened immune systems. Some are in prison, living in extremely close quarters to one another. None would get priority when it comes to healthcare.”

According to official figures, coronavirus transmission in Russia is some way off the explosive growth seen in the United States and Europe. But already numbers are edging up, with a record 771 new infections counted overnight on Wednesday, bringing the total to more than 3,500. Authorities are now nervous that the epidemic is moving to a new phase of community transmission. Over the weekend, Moscow city government introduced some of the strictest lockdown regulations in the world, with 27 regional governments soon following the capital’s lead.

On the face of it, the measures should help protect some of the most vulnerable. Russians were never likely to adhere to the soft advisory that was hastily appended on to President Vladimir Putin’s announcement of a “non-working” week. But the blunt lockdown will put stress on frontline populations in myriad different ways.

Russia’s homeless, in particular, will be pushed further underground. There are no accurate statistics on the number of rough sleepers in the country – partly because of the high attrition rate – but a reasonable estimate puts the numbers in the high thousands. Half dead, they huddle together in abandoned buildings, forests, and near metro stations. For many of them, social distancing simply isn’t an option.

Timofei, 21, surname withheld, was once one of the Invisibles of the northern capital, St Petersburg. He found himself on the streets aged 18, after being swindled out of home and documents by gangsters. For a few months, he was kept as a slave on a building site. He managed to escape from that terror, but without documents had few options. He slept in parks and ventilation shafts in the city’s subway, sharing the space with rodents that occasionally doubled as food.

Five months ago, Timofei found relative safety in a shelter project called Nochlezhka. The shelter is one of the few places offering accommodation for the homeless in Russia. There, he was helped to reset his life, reissue his documents, and find a job as a food delivery courier. He now finds himself a key worker in one of the few industries not to have been paralysed by the coronavirus.

He says hasn’t forgotten those he spent time with. “I shiver when I think about those times. I know these people. When coronavirus hits, and it will, there will be nowhere for them to run. The state couldn’t give a s**t about what happens.”

Katerina Cheremisina, a spokesperson for Nochlezhka, says the shelter has written to authorities in Moscow and St Petersburg, urging them to prepare for the emergency. They have yet to receive a reply. She says: “If there is a plan, we don’t know about it. There is no advice. There is still a huge amount of stigma in government and in the population in general.”

Russian charity generally fares better when it comes to helping the elderly and disabled. Over the past decade or so, many local NGOs have sprung to life, offering support and services to the vulnerable and their families. Local authorities are also expanding social provisions – from home care to sports classes for the elderly. Needless to say, the crisis has already shut down all but the most essential of these services. But many now worry how even these services will perform in the event of a major crisis.

Valentina Frolova, a lawyer for Perspektiva, an NGO assisting disabled people, says the system still has serious holes. Even now, in normal conditions, disabled people in Russia face deficits of specialist medicine, she says. In conditions of a major lockdown, some may be left to fend for themselves without any obvious way of doing so.

Life away from the main cities will likely prove ugliest of all. Without infrastructure for proper social support, families tend to be the only resource disabled people can rely on. Writer Tamara Cheremnova, 64, who lives with cerebral palsy in a small Siberian town, tells The Independent that provincial Russia is largely hostile to the disabled.

The award-winning author’s own life story offers plenty of supporting evidence for her criticisms. Abandoned to an orphanage aged six, Cheremnova was labelled as mentally retarded, and transferred to a mental asylum upon reaching adulthood. It was only when social services staff read her manuscripts much later in life that they realised Cheremnova had been cruelly misdiagnosed, and they had a genius on their hands.

“I’m certain many people will die from this epidemic simply because they are disabled,” the writer tells The Independent. “Take my situation as an example. I can’t help myself, I’m socially defenceless, and if it comes to it, they won’t even take me if I appear at a hospital. Make no mistake, we’re right at the bottom of society.”

Even if the virus itself passes by, the crisis is certain to discriminate against the weak by hitting their pockets. Russia’s disabled are typically heavily reliant on paltry state benefits and pensions. In the reality of locked-down Russia – where retailers can choose their price on basic staples – those benefits simply aren’t sufficient. Staying at home also means expensive online delivery services, which the poor can ill afford.

In Moscow, authorities have begun to recognise the increased costs disabled people are facing, but they’ve yet to offer a proper remedy. At the start of a recent quarantine for high-risk residents, they wired two 2,000 rouble (£20) payments to pensioners and people with chronic conditions. Obviously, the payments fall far short of what is needed.

“More work needs to be done simply to stand still, to keep even the limited support we give vulnerable people at its previous level,” lawyer Frolova says. “We have to think hard and think more about how it feels to be in their shoes.”

One side effect of 2020’s bizarre new reality is that in a lockdown, ordinary Russians are now beginning to experience precisely that – the social isolation that so many of their hidden compatriots experience daily.

Ivan Bakaidov, a 21-year-old programmer and blogger living with cerebral palsy in St Petersburg, has even suggested the crisis offered an opportunity. Writing in a series of social media posts, Bakaidov said the coronavirus epidemic could lead to greater understanding of the lives and problems of vulnerable people living in Russia. He called on disabled people to share their stories about living in isolation; a lively exchange ensued.

“Those living with disabilities are so isolated from an inaccessible outside world that the virus is unlikely to touch them,” the blogger tells The Independent. “But this is a moment that we can finally tell people about our predicament.”