PUBLIC HEALTH AND HEALTHCARE SYSTEM IN RUSSIA

The article discusses the main reasons of the poor public health in Russia. There are such unfavorable indicators of health: low life expectancy and birth rates, high morbidity and mortality (especially among people of working age). In modern Russia the health of popula- tion is negatively affected by environmental factors, psycho-emotional stress because of eco- nomic crisis, and the low level of culture. But the main significant negative impact on health is provided by the underfunding of the health sector and inequality of Russian citizens in ac- cess to satisfactory health care. In the face of declining public health expenditure, people are forced to pay for medical services themselves. Therefore private expensive medicine sup- plants free medicine. The public health expenditure should be at least 6.6 % of GDP (instead of 3.5 % nowadays) to achieve satisfactory level of the public health