Russia’s sexual health crisis just got militarised

As Ukraine pushes forward its long-anticipated counteroffensive, Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu seems more concerned with reeling in his institutional rivals, not least the wildcard Wagner group. But internecine institutional tensions are not the only affliction plaguing Russian occupation forces. As temperatures rise and the Ukrainians press the frontline, infectious diseases remain another challenge for Russian forces.

In Wagner’s assault on Bakhmut, the self-proclaimed ‘most powerful army in the world’ made a slow, eight-month advance and suffered soaring casualties, of which 90 per cent were reportedly prisoner recruits. One in five of the 50,000 Wagner prisoner recruits who made up the bulk of their assault on Bakhmut were HIV positive – and a staggering 80 per cent arrived on the frontline with some sort of infectious disease, such as hepatitis, according to a recent New York Times report.

Independent sources in Ukraine suggest that Wagner uses medical bracelets – red for those with HIV, and white indicating someone has hepatitis C. Ukrainian hospitals have reportedly refused to treat Wagner mercenaries because, according to a report in Ukrainkska Pravda, many of the fighters are suffering from HIV/AIDS, syphilis, tuberculosis and pneumonia.

However, the difficulties facing Wagner is just the tip of the iceberg of Russia’s health crisis. As much of the world successfully implemented scientific-consensus backed policy to mitigate sexually transmitted infections (STIs) such as HIV and hepatitis, (for which a substantial proportion of infections are due to intravenous drug use), Russia opted for the opposite approach. As a result, it is now – along with its neighbours in Central Asia – the only region of the world where HIV is still on the rise.

Putin is as much to blame for this health crisis as he is for the war in Ukraine. He is a leader committed to anti-Western rhetoric who cuts down his critics and tends to his own image as a traditionalist strongman. Inevitably, then, Putin is unlikely to back policies which support marginalised groups, such as drug users. Unfortunately for Russia, those are precisely the policies which tend to work…

Jason Pack and Guy Fiennes in The Spectator.