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MOSCOW: When Russian cardiologist Alexei Erlikh and several colleagues started a project to follow up on doctors who had died from the coronavirus, you never expected that there would be so many names.
Launched last week, the database already lists more than 70 dead doctors, nurses and laboratory technicians, and the number is expected to grow as Russia approaches its peak of infections.
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“Many colleagues are dying. It is quite difficult to see a new name every day,” Erlikh told AFP.
“There will be more victims among the doctors. The list is far from complete.”
The main purpose of the “Memories List” is to honor doctors. But Erlikh said that he and his colleagues also felt they had to take matters into their own hands because they did not trust the authorities to provide reliable information on the deaths of health workers.
Russia registers several thousand new coronavirus infections a day and, with more than 99,000, has overtaken China and Iran in the number of cases.
Its death rate, with 972 deaths as of Wednesday, is low compared to countries like Italy, Spain and the United States.
Except, according to the Memories List, when it comes to medical workers.
Of some 27,000 deaths in Italy, 151 were doctors. In China, 40 medical staff are registered as having died from the virus and in the United States it was April 27-9, the latest figure available.
The Memory List as of Wednesday showed 74 medical staff members who had died from the virus. Seventy died in Russia, with more than half of Moscow and the surrounding region.
Four were from neighboring Belarus, whose authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko rejected the coronavirus epidemic as a “psychosis” and refused to impose a general blockade.
“UNITED MEDICAL COMMUNITY”
Erlikh, who runs the cardiac ICU at Moscow City Hospital No. 29, spoke to AFP from his home, where he isolated himself after testing positive for the coronavirus.
He said that at least 70 percent of his unit also tested positive.
Since the beginning of the epidemic, doctors in Russia have complained about the shortage of protective equipment and test kits, as well as the unwillingness of some hospitals and clinics to evaluate their staff because they do not want to quarantine them.
As a result, they say, many hospitals have become coronavirus hot spots.
Neurosurgeon Alexei Kashcheyev said the doctors’ list of victims was the latest evidence that Russia’s underfunded health care system was unprepared to deal with a major crisis.
“This was expected,” he said, adding that complaints from overworked and poorly paid staff have fallen on deaf ears for years.
Kashcheyev said he personally knew two victims from the list, which he praised and rated as more reliable than any official statistic.
“Our medical community is quite close. We are exchanging information related to our safety and the safety of our families and patients,” he said.
He said he hopes the list can help families of doctors receive financial help from authorities in the future.
While officials acknowledge the shortage of protective equipment, they emphasize that the country has worked hard to expand testing capabilities and say Russia’s death rate of less than one percent is among the lowest in the world.
“THE ALARM SOUNDS”
But critics allege that Russia is underreporting coronavirus deaths and that the official death toll for medical workers has not been released.
The health ministry did not respond to an AFP request about the number of coronavirus victims among health personnel or the reaction to the list of doctors.
Anastasia Vasilyeva, director of the Alliance of Doctors, an independent union of medical workers, accused officials of trying to minimize the deaths of health personnel.
She said the doctors’ count appeared to be a significant count, noting that some regions were not represented on the list and estimating that at least 200 medical workers had died in Russia from the virus.
“I myself can add about 10 names to that list. I get messages every day: ‘This person died. And that person died,'” said Vasilyeva, whose group is linked to opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Critics say the rising death toll should be a wake-up call for the Kremlin, which has prioritized defense spending over health care.
“When this is all over, I think that we, both doctors and society, should sound the alarm about this problem and demand that it be resolved,” Kashcheyev said.
“We have a right to do it.”
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