From the history of health development in Soviet Tuva (1944-1991)

The article examines the facts and events pertaining to the history of healthcare in Tuva during the Soviet period of its history and sums up the major trends in this field in the 1940s-1980s, including its specific features predetermined by the historical, economic, cultural and other factors. Also provided is a short overview of the existing literature on the article’s topic. Setting up a system of local healthcare commenced after Russia’s People’s Commissariat of Healthcare (Narkomzdrav RSFSR) decreed a program of largescale deployment of dispensaries, hospitals, medical stations and local health posts (obstetric stations) in Tuva Autonomous Oblast (TAO). It was to be staffed with trained medical personnel and provided with equipment and medicaments. The article cites the statistics on how many school graduates in Tuva were accepted into medical colleges, on local training of healthcare cadres and the regional conferences of healthcare professionals. Special attention is paid to S.A. Serekkei, the first Tuvan to graduate as a medical doctor (from the I.I. Mechnikov 2nd Leningrad Meical Institute) and the role he played in the development of regional healthcare. Also examined and grouped by decade are the events of the 1950-s and 1960-s – especially those of the latter decade when after the upgrading of the region’s status from TAO to the Tuvan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Tuvan ASSR) many ethnic Tuvans trained as doctors. In this decade, the regional Ministry of Healthcare was re-established, and Tuvan medical researchers started to defend dissertations for the degrees of candidate and doctor of science. Overall, the Soviet period saw a great increase in the number of personnel, treatment-and-prophylactic institutions and bed capacity. These three indicators had a positive impact on life expectancy in the region. The sustainable growth of Tuva’s healthcare reached its peak by the end of the Soviet period of the region’s history