LONDON, March 23 (Reuters) - Russians' fondness for vodka and other spirits
has taken its toll on the vast country's life expectancy, scientists said
on Friday.
Since the mid-1980s how long Russians were expected to live has see-sawed
dramatically. Researchers attributed this, at least in part, to alcohol
consumption.
"Life expectancy had improved in the 1990s, however, it is declining
once again and alcohol seems to be playing a major part in this," Professor
Martin McKee, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told
Reuters.
Russians have always lagged behind their European neighbours in life
expectancy but things took a dramatic turn for the good in 1985 when former
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introduced an anti-alcohol campaign.
Life expectancy rose until 1988 when it started to fall steeply until
1994. It climbed again in the mid 1990s before beginning a new slide in
1998.
Figures for 1999 show Russian men were expected to live to about 60
years and women to 72 years, compared to 74 years for European men and
81 for women.
In a report in The Lancet medical journal, McKee and Vladimir Shkolnikov
from the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Germany compared
the fluctuating trends to the causes of deaths during the same periods.
They found that the rise in life expectancy between 1994 and 1998 corresponded
with a drop in deaths due to acute alcoholic poisoning and other alcohol-related
causes, as well as suicides and homicides.
"The causes that showed an increase during 1991-1994 followed by a decline
in 1994-1998 were mainly those that, at least in Russia, have been linked
to heavy drinking," they said in the report.