ABSTRACT
The Soviet social welfare system was notorious for the discrepancies between aspiration and reality. Health care and poor relief were no exceptions. The state of health care was likewise far from satisfactory. In order to understand the window-dressing of the Soviet state and the strong position of non-conventional medicine in Russia today, it is imperative to return to the era of Peter the Great, the generally acknowledged starting point of modern Russian history. Even if every fourth doctor in the world was indeed Soviet in 1973, other problems certainly overshadowed this achievement – poorly trained hospital staff, chronic shortages of medicine and basic supplies, a lack of modern medical technology, a basic neglect of hygiene and enormous environmental problems. Life expectancy in the Soviet Union has consequently been considerably lower than in other industrialised countries. Consequently, under Catherine's reign Russian state systematically organised health care and poor relief for the first time – at least in St Petersburg and Moscow.
