p According to official data, in 1970, the Soviet Union had about 700,000 doctors, while the number of persons with a secondary medical education (nurses, technicians and other personnel) exceeded 2 million. Reference books on medical education show that increasingly more doctors and other medical workers are being trained in the USSR with each passing year. For example, more than 30,000 doctors have graduated annually from medical colleges in the last four years. Some foreign readers of this book may wonder why the Soviet Union needs so many physicians and other medical and auxiliary personnel in the health services, since the Soviet Union already has more than a quarter of the total number of the world’s doctors and more than half the total number of Europe’s doctors, whereas the population of the USSR, which numbered 243.9 million in 1971, constitutes only one-fifteenth of the world’s population.

p Other facts about public health in the Soviet Union may also seem puzzling. For example, it was reported that in 1969 some 9.5 million people had a rest and received medical treatment at health resorts and in sanatoriums, holiday homes and boarding houses, including more than 7 million industrial and office workers, who received accommodation wholly or partly at the expense of the state or special social insurance funds. This figure appears particularly large, since in many countries sanatoriums and health resorts are too expensive to be afforded by more than a limited part of the population.

p The uninformed reader will be astonished by the facts about the improvement of public health in the Soviet Union. They are indeed amazing. In only some 50 odd years, out of which 20 were spent in wars to defend our country’s freedom and independence and in restoration of its economy, general and child mortality have decreased severalfold, many formerly widespread infectious and parasitic diseases have been wiped out, and the health of Soviet citizens is on a par with the world’s highest standards.

p To gain an insight into this and many other questions, those who are interested in Soviet public health and medicine would, of course, do well to see the country for themselves and acquaint themselves with the work of the health services, with the doctors, nurses and other Soviet medical 6 workers. Naturally, no printed matter can take the place of personal impressions, although it can provide answers to many questions.

p It is this purpose—to furnish the reader with information on the Soviet health protection system, medical science, the changes that have taken place in public health and the training of doctors and other medical personnel—that this book is meant to fulfil. We hope, moreover, that it will give some idea of the historically unique social experiment carried out in the USSR, the experiment that has transformed the country into one of the world’s leading industrial powers with a progressive system of public health services.

p At the end of June 1968 a session was held in Moscow of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR—the country’s highest body of state power. The session paid special attention to the question of the medical care of the population. The Supreme Soviet of the USSR and, later, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Council of Ministers of the USSR passed resolutions aimed at further developing and improving medical care and public health services in the USSR. These documents are indicative of the solicitude displayed by the state power for safeguarding and improving the health of all Soviet people and of the importance attached to health protection as a significant branch of the national economy.

p “As a result of the construction of a socialist society in the USSR, the consolidation of its economic power, the steady rise in the material and cultural standards of the people and the progress of science, a great deal has been successfully achieved in the preservation and improvement of public health. The socialist principles of health protection—free and universally available skilled medical aid and extensive preventive measures against disease—are being consistently put into effect.” These words from the resolution of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR can serve as a key to understanding how it was possible to improve the state of public health in so short a period of time.

p The Principles of Legislation on Health Protection for the USSR and the Union Republics adopted by the Session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR held in December 1969, embraced the most important propositions connected with the protection of public health, as a task of the socialist state, and of the whole of socialist society. This document conforms 7 to the spirit of socialist democracy and emphasises the need for the most extensive participation of the population in the public health protection. It is well known that Lenin, whose 100th birthday was celebrated in 1970 by all progressive mankind, attached decisive importance to the participation of the masses of the population in the construction of socialism. Tn his work, ’flic Slate and Revolution, he emphasised that "only socialism will be the beginning of a rapid, genuine, truly mass forward movement, embracing first the majority and then the whole of the population, in all spheres of public and private life.”  [7•* 

p This legislative act on public health helps to give the entire population a better insight into the public health system and the role of the state and of society in improving the health of the people, it acquaints them with their rights to medical care and the need for active participation in the health protection measures. It is particularly important that the Principles emphasise not only the duty of the state to provide free medical aid to the entire population, but also the duty of each citizen to take care of his own health and be considerate to the health of other members of society. This follows from the duty of each citizen to regard his own health as social property, as society’s main wealth.

In addition to extensive factual material and statistics on the development of the public health services and the health of the population, this book also deals with the most important theoretical principles that have made it possible to build a modern health protection system in the USSR.