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Soviet Union [USSR] Mortality and Fertility
Between 1970 and 1986, the mortality rate in the Soviet Union
increased from 8.2 per 1,000 to 9.8 per 1,000. Some of this
increase was attributable to the aging of the population, as the
number of old-age (fifty-five for women, sixty for men) pensioners
grew from 36.5 million to 47.4 million. Other factors, however,
contributed to this upswing, one of the most disturbing of which
was an increase in the mortality of infants and able-bodied men.
The male mortality increase was highlighted by the almost ten-year
differential in male and female life expectancies. Intense
urbanization and the attendant pressures of living and working in
an urban environment undoubtedly exacerbated the mortality rate. As
in most developed countries, the leading causes of death in the
Soviet Union were cardiovascular diseases, malignant tumors, and
injuries and accidents. Suicide cases in 1987 were officially
recorded at 54,105, or 19.1 per 100,000 population.
Under Gorbachev a concerted effort has been made to reduce
mortality and improve productivity. The government initiated active
campaigns to limit the number of deaths from accidents and chronic
degenerative diseases by drastically curtailing the availability of
alcohol and by attempting to persuade the more than 70 million (in
1986 about 25 percent of the population) smokers to renounce the
habit. The overall health of the population, the state of Soviet
health care, and the environment became recurrent topics of open
discussion and debate. By 1986 these measures seemed to be having
some effect: one year was added to average male life expectancy,
and mortality started to decline. Some Soviet demographers
stressed, however, that long-term improvements would only be
ensured by focusing on four factors that they believed to be major
determinants of the level of mortality: the quality of life,
including working and living conditions, nutrition, and clothing;
the quality of the environment; the quality and accessibility of
health care; and the people's sanitary and hygienic habits.
In the 1970-78 intercensal period, overall fertility rates in
the Soviet Union declined slightly. Regionally, however, there were
sharp differences. In Soviet Central Asia, for example, women
consistently expected to have at least twice as many children as
their counterparts in the European part of the Russian Republic.
The Caucasus region registered rates between these two extremes.
The government addressed the issue of declining fertility by
enacting a series of measures in the late 1970s and early 1980s
aimed at making it easier for women to cope with the onerous burden
of being mother, wife, and worker
(see Soviet Union USSR - Population Problems and Policies
, this ch.;
Soviet Union USSR - Role of Women
, ch. 5).
Data as of May 1989
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