RUSSIA: Vladimir Putin is being urged to find a remedy for the national curse, which claims half a million lives a year, writes Tom Parfitt in Moscow
Perfume, brake fluid, de-icer, meths, toilet cleaner, nail varnish remover . . . "I drank them all," says Boris Kuznetsov. "Everything that burns."
Like many Russian alcoholics, the 53-year-old former laser specialist from a top Moscow physics institute slithered into his darkest drinking days during the turmoil of perestroika.
He gave up his job, was rejected by his family and ended up sleeping on the floor of a filthy apartment without a stick of furniture. And when President Gorbachev launched his anti-alcohol campaign, Mr Kuznetsov turned to the hard stuff. "I only survived because I got poisoned by some chemical cleaning agent quite early on and I couldn't drink it any more," he says. "After that I stuck to cologne."
An estimated 500,000 Russians die each year from alcohol-related causes, a figure that covers about 30 per cent of all male deaths.
Vodka and other hard spirits remain the drink of choice, taking up three-quarters of official consumption.
As President Vladimir Putin takes over the presidency of the G8 industrialised nations this month, he is being urged to tackle "Russia's curse". The World Bank called for action last month, finding alcoholism played a major part in falling male life expectancy, already down to 58 years.
It is an opportune moment. Holidays such as New Year and Orthodox Christmas, which occurs today, are a traditional time for mammoth benders, or "drinking without drying out", when bottles of vodka are regularly downed around kitchen tables.
With the help of a 12-step recovery programme, Mr Kuznetsov is now in control of his illness. Yet millions remain trapped by the disease and new research suggests worrying trends in consumption.
Mr Putin highlighted the mounting danger in his annual address last year, pointing out that 40,000 people a year are killed by alcohol poisoning.
Yet critics say legislation designed to tackle the problem is ineffective or even favours big alcohol producers. Taxation on alcohol is low, with the cheapest bottles of vodka costing 30 roubles. Production of over-proof moonshine vodka called samogon is rife: an estimated four bottles are drunk in the countryside for every licensed one.
There is a rising scepticism about the common methods of treating alcoholics. Most state clinics rely on "coding", a method invented by the Soviet psychiatrist Alexander Dovzhenko. Hypnosis or suggestion are used to scare patients into believing they will die or be permanently injured if they drink again. Some are given a placebo and told it is a drug that reacts violently with alcohol.
For many it is a swift, brutal lesson, but rarely effective over a long period. "They gabble something at you, make a woo-woo sound in your ears and then tell you your testicles will fall off if you touch a drop," said Aleksei, a middle-aged alcoholic, who has been coded several times. "It never worked for me."
Alexander Nemtsov, one of the country's leading experts on alcoholism, is doubtful. "Coding worked to an extent on the Soviet person because he was suggestible," says the professor, from Moscow's state scientific and research institute of psychiatry. "Now, as we become more sceptical, like people in the west, it's less and less effective."
Back on the rails, Mr Kuznetsov thinks only long-term group therapy can wean a person off drink for good. "Without that I would never have managed."
However, Alcoholics Anonymous has fewer than 300 groups in the country (compared with 1,500 in Poland) and only a few state clinics provide similar programmes. Asked what is lacking in the state approach to reducing alcoholism, Prof Nemtsov says: "There is no approach. The leadership of our country has forgotten about this problem."
Between 30 and 60 per cent of alcohol is clandestinely made. "Practically all this illegal production thrives on corruption," the professor says. "Every local policeman in the country knows the house where samogon is made. But he does nothing about it in exchange for his own free supply." - (Guardian service)