ABSTRACT
Poland never accepted communism easily but nonetheless experiencedits ill effects on health. As elsewhere in the former socialist countries, mortality began rising for Polish males in the mid-1960s and was concentrated among middle-aged members of the working class. The end of communist domination came in 1989. Yet democracy did not bring an immediate halt to the downturn in life expectancy; rather, health conditions in Poland continued to deteriorate until recently. Whereas Poland’s general health pattern is similar to that in the other Soviet-bloc countries, there are some important differences in the Polish experience with communism.
