Soviet Health Problems

Abstract

At the Twenty-Sixth Party Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union held in February-March 1981, the general secretary of the party, Leonid Brezhnev, addressed the issue of health conditions and delivery in the country. Brezhnev indicated that improving the health of Soviet citizens was among the most important social tasks. He noted that a major decree was issued 22 September 1977 on measures to improve health in the country and that the capacity of polyclinics had increased by 500,000 since the Party Congress held five years earlier. He then confronted the negative side of the health-delivery issue: