DISEASE CONTROL IN KHERSON

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-00810A001200540008-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 10, 2009
• Sequence Number: 8
• Publication Date: July 9, 1953
• Content Type: REPORT

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CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
INFORMATION REPORT
SECRET
SECURITY INFORMATION
USSR (Iherson Oblast)
Disease Control in Eher?son
This Document contains information affecting the Na-
tional Defense of the United States, within the mean-
ing of Title 18, Sections 793 and 794, of the U.B. Code, as
amended. Its transmission or revelation of its contents
to or receipt by an unauthorized person is prohibited
by law. The reproduction of this form is prohibited.
REPORT
DATE DISTR.
NO. OF PAGES
REQUIREMENT
REFERENCES
THE SOURCE EVALUATIONS IN THIS REPORT ARE DEFINITIVE.
THE APPRAISAL OF CONTENT IS TENTATIVE.
(FOR KEY SEE REVERSE)
1. In general the health situation in Pierson was unsatisfactory but this
fact was never off'S.rially published or acknowledged.
Malmo
2. Malaria was widespread in KYLerson. During the spring the Dnieper River
overflowed, and on receding left swampy ponds in the river bottoms.
Anopheles mosquitoes bred in these swamps, so, that new cases of malaria
occurred in the early summer. In 1952 the Soviet health authorities set
up a malaria station from which the fight against this disease was
directed. The fight was oarried on in two phases, In'the first phase,
"Bonificator", or "scouts of a reconnaissance service", were' sent out from
the malaria station to various areas in the city to collect information oon-
earning the ground- px?oblems which mist be corrected. This group then presented
_e _1_ a._m a.i - i X11 M7+ Mna n17.1 +M
pools. During the stage when. the mosquito larvae were developing, open
trenches and stagnant pools were covered by oil (from hand-operated pumps)
by the employees of the malaria station. A campaign had been under way
for some years, and was still in operation in 1952, for the reclamation of
flooded areas, not only to remove malaria breeding grounds but also to
STATES ARMY NAVY AIR
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9 July 1953
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furnish new cultivation land. The station which directed this.
ground improvement was on the Sh n2vi tsk: side of the Dnieper, oppo-
site Kherson.
medical
The second phase of the malarial con f program was the themalaria
treatment of victims of the . disease; o
station had, 'two physicians and two medical assistants, for this
purpose, Injections of quinine or akrikhin (atebrin) and tablets
.Qf a.krikhin (in doses of 0.3 grams) were given to those who were
suffering from the disease.- Akrikhin tablets were also used as a
Pr) h lactic measure against malaria..
venereal Dieeries
prior to the war* venereal diseases were only infrequently encoun-
tered in.Kherson. Venereal incidence increased during the-German
occupation of Kherson, and during the postwar years, because of
thQ low standard of living. Young women resorted to prostitution
,
People contracting VD
es
l
v
.
as a means of supporting themse
generally of low cultural level, failed to report the disease.
al incidence
d i
n equ
Gonorrhea aid syphilis were foun
No punishment was meted out to civilians with VD; military person-
nel,,werepunished according to the attitude and severity of the
c'gmmanding officer (guardhouse confinement was the usual penalty).
Communist Party Members who contracted VD could be expelled from
the Komsomol and the Party.
5. Kherson had a VD dispensary, and a branch prophylaxis stationiwhich
was open 24 hours a day. 0onorrhea.was'treated,
enicillin in ectio s 25X1
(one injection every two hours until a total of five
penic
had been administered) was em to ed
Immediately after World War II, penicillin 25X1
ion; in
Soviet U
th
i
n
e
n
was available for use
1952, Soviet, German and Hungarian penicillin was available.
Prior to the war years, syphilis.was treated with drugs containing
mercury.; in 1952 the therapy employed was to administer enicillin
t
neo-ealvarsan and. bismuth in a series of trea
mentsp ysician
a Ministered arsenic and bismuth in addition to the penicillin. 25X1
Treatment for VD was free. Some physicians maintained a private
practice after their normal working hours, although this was not
sanctioned officially. Patients who were treated by physicians
under each circumstances were required to pay whatever fee the
physician asked.,, These physicians stole the necessary drugs for
VD treatment from polyclinic supplies.. a case 25X1
sician in Germany;
h
y
,.evolving theft of drugs by a-Soviet army p
took penicillin from Army stores
ian
i
h
c
ys
a p
.25X1
n
an su stituted bismuth therapy for penicilli
use
at
i
r
,
e
v
pr
fi
therapy during?'normal duty hours to cover his theft. Punishment
'or this' was a' sentence of 10 yearn imprisonment in a labor camp.
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Amoebic Dysentery
8. It was generally accepted by authorities in Kherson that the city
was.seripusly'affected by amoebic dysentery. Spread of the infec-
tioti"was increased by the absence of control of drinking water in
Kherson and surrounding areas. The Dnieper River water was drunk
regularl without treatment.
Amoebic
dysentery was said to be wide-spread in the Asiatic section of the -
USSR..
Bacillary Dysentery
9. This disease occurred in Kherson,
Food. Poisoning
10. la few isolated cases of food poisoning in Kherson; 25X1
these were traced to the drinking of methanol, eating infected ice
cream sold by private vendors, and eating packaged meats from the
8th of March Food Processing Plant in Kherson. This plant packaged
fish and meat. Sporadic cases of botulism occurred every year and
were attributed to infected products of the 8th of March plant.
No deaths from such poisoning were reported.
11. Whenever private citizens wanted to slaughter one of their diseased
animals, they were. required to obtain a permit from a government
veterinarian certifying that the animal was fit for human consump-
tion; these private owners were then allowed to make'sau,sage,.and
other meat products from the meat and sell these products without
supervision.
Intestinal Parasites
12 .. Many people in.Kherson were infested with ascarides and taeniae.
Treatment for removal of these worms from infected individuals
consisted of administrations of enemas, or of santonin. Occasion-
ally, physicians prescribed "English Salt" ("Angliyskaya. Sol"),
Plague
13. the last case of plague in the Southern Ukraine
occurred in 1
-Tetanus
14. Tetanus occurred. throughout the Ukraine, and several cases were
reported every year. Tetanus vaccine was administered whenever
danger of infection occurred:- Only individuals who?had not received
pro ective inoculations contracted tetanus. Medical assistants or
nurees in small villages were permitted to administer tetanus vaccine
to infected villagers, but active immunization was not in practice..
Tularemia
15, Tularemia did not occur in the Kherson Oblast. but
was rauna in the 5lavgorod steppe area in the northern Kazakh SSR,
e the prairie. Soviet textbooks stated that the"suslik", which
is found in the Ukraine, is also a source of tularemia infection
s
The "suslik" is a? small animal similar .in size to a.rat; it has a
whiskered cat-like head,'a tail which is only-two inches long, and
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is of a greyish yellow color. It lives underground and stores
grain'in its burrow.- These animals were eaten during the famine
in'the Ukraine. A campaign was under way in 1952 to destroy the
nsu.slik". A government fur agency gave rewards of cloth goods to
Any-one bringing in the dead animals, and even furnished traps to
suslik-hunter
Rabies
16. Rabies occurred only rarely in Kherson, and people who were bitten.
by rabid animals were advised to 'repaT-t ?u ~, for treatment
to local health offices. Vaccine was administered at any hospital,
and, probably, at small village health stations.
Typhus
17. Only isolated cases of typhus occurred in Kherson in recent years..
The-number of cases of the disease increased immediately after the
war, but no epidemics occurred and the incidence rapidly declined.
Typhoid and Paratyphoid Fevers
18. No serious outbreaks of typhoid and paratyphoid fevers occurred in
the-last few years in Kherson. An epidemic of typhoid fever.
occurred in Kherson in 1940,
At present,
cases of typhoid fever and paratyphoid fever occur irregularly
during the summer months.
Poliomyelitis
19. It was the general opinion in the USSR that poliomyelitis occurred
only infrequently in that country before 1948. Since that time.
the number of cases has increased, especially in the western
European section; Soviet doctors attributed this to introduction
of the disease from countries outside of the Soviet Union.
Tuberculosis
20. Tuberculosis presented the most serious problem to medical author-
ities in Kherson. A special tuberculosis station for children
was.set up to combat this disease. This station (Tubdispense,r)
administered tuberculin'tests to assist in diagnosis; chest,-ray
films and sputum analyses were also employed. Adults were exam-
ined at the local hospitals which had tuberculosis specia
and TB sections:
21. Treatment of tuberculosis was conservative- isolation, rest, and
,injections of calcium (calcium chloride and sodium
bicarbonate Tic7 were administered.
was utilized.' Streptomycin
was known, but was no widely used as a medicine because it was
very. scarce and very expensive..
25X1
(Penicillin was sometimes administered 25X1
to TB patients, but only for supportive therapy.
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22. TB sanatoriums were located in the Crimea, especially in Yalta, and.
iii-the Altay region of.Asia. This latter area became more widely
known in the postwar years.
Animal Diseases
23.
24'. In the postwar period, there was an outbreak of landers (Sau)
among horses..I
25. Swine erysipelas (Rozha) epidemics occurred regularly year after
year'in the Kherson Oblast. They were usually localized, however,
and confined to one or two villages. It was required by law that
small pigs must be administered a vaccine against erysipelas .
26. A swine plague. (known in Kherson as "Chumka" and in the Ukrainian
language as "Chervonka" was also found
Pigs in the Kherson region were known to be hosts for 25X1
intestinal worms. Trichinosis also occurred as-a result of eating
infected pork,-presumably from swine of the Kherson Oblast.
27.- A very-contagious fowl plague was.endemic in this region. It was
characterized b
s
y a
udden onset of diarrhea, a blue comb, and
lowering of body-temperature during the night; death followed
rapidly after ;the appearance of first signs of the di
e
seas
sporadic outbreak occurred every year and " 25X1
the disease was found in the air.
28. There was a disease of sheep which occurred rarely in the Kherson
area caused b
th
i
i
y
e
nvas
on of the sheep's liver by flukes.
o e cause y the sheep grazing in wet grass.
29. Animals.-found in the Kherson area included cows, sheep, pigs,
chickens,and horses. Dairies in the surrounding area usually had
1,000 cattle. Such large enterprises had one or two veterinarians
as permanent employees. Sheep were found from Kher-son to Askaniya-
Nova.~ Pigs in the area of Askaniya-Nova included a breed called
Ukrainian Steppe pig (Ukrairzskaya Stepnaya Poroda),. famous for its
high meat and low fat yield. This animal weighed about 350 kg.
and was long and narrow. Chickens were raised for the most part
on the right bank of the Dnieper River.
30.. _In the Dnieper River, opposite Kherson, were three islands called
:.Quarantine Islands". These islands had no inhabitants and no
animals were raised there. No quarantine duties were.carried on..
there; the name was apparently given to the islands many years ago.
31
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