MOSCOW, April 9, 2009. Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents the information on how Russians assess the state of their health, health of their relatives, and who, they think, is fully responsible for the poor health of people.
Over the recent years the number of Russians assessing their health as "good" or "very good" has slightly changed: from 2006 to present this share has been fluctuating within 27-31%, in April of the current year 24% of Russians assess their health as "good", 3% - as "very good". 49% of Russians report satisfactory state of health, 23% are complaining on weak health (19% - weak, 4% - very weak). The shares of such respondents have also slightly changed over the past years.
Those who report good health are men (35% compared to 21% among women), the Urals residents and Siberians (38% and 33% respectively against 22-27% in other regions), 18-24-year old respondents (55% vs. 5% among respondents aged 60 and above).
58% of Russians are satisfied with the health of their relatives (47% - rather satisfied, 11% - in general satisfied), 54% of Russians said so in 2006, and 56% - in 2008. Meanwhile, the share of those who negatively assess the state of their relatives has decreased over three years: in 2006 46% of Russians expressed such opinion (33% - rather dissatisfied, 12% - completely dissatisfied), now 38% of respondents think so (30% and 8% respectively). The higher the financial state self-esteem of Russians is, the more often they are satisfied with the state of health of their relatives: 75% of respondents with high financial state self-esteem against 43% of those with low financial state self-esteem.
«Most of respondents put the blame for their poor health on themselves (41%). 34% find the reason in low living standards, 29% - in poor ecological situation. 21% of Russians think that medical staff should be blamed due to their low qualification level and inattentiveness. 15% tend to point out state. And finally, every tenth (10%) consider that no one is to blame for poor health state of our citizens, and 2% are confident all diseases come from God for our sins.
The Russians` views on who is responsible for poor health have slightly changed. The share of those who blame themselves has increased (from 37% in 2008 to 41% in the current year), and vice versa, our citizens rarer point out low standard of living (from 41% to 34%). Respondents put more attention to ecological situation (from 25% to 29%); on the contrary, Russians tend to blame state less (from 22% to 15%).
Respondents with higher or incomplete higher education consider that people themselves are fully responsible for their poor state of health (48%); Russians with secondary and incomplete secondary education more tend to put the blame on low living standards (44%).
The initiative Russians opinion poll was conducted on April 4-5, 2009.
1600 respondents were interviewed at 140 sampling points in 42 regions of Russia.
The margin of error does not exceed 3.4%.
How would you assess the state of your health? (close-ended question, one answer) | ||||
| 2006 | 2008 |
| 2009 |
Very good | 4 | 3 |
| 3 |
Good | 27 | 24 |
| 24 |
Satisfactory | 45 | 49 |
| 49 |
Weak | 19 | 18 |
| 19 |
Very weak | 5 | 5 |
| 4 |
Hard to tell | 1 | 1 |
| 0 |
How would you assess the state of your health? (close-ended question, one answer) | |||
| Total respondents | Sex | |
Men | Women | ||
Very good | 3 | 4 | 2 |
Good | 24 | 31 | 19 |
Satisfactory | 49 | 48 | 51 |
Weak | 19 | 15 | 22 |
Very weak | 4 | 2 | 6 |
Hard to tell | 0 | 0 | 0 |
In general, are you satisfied with the state of health of your family and close relatives? (close-ended question, one answer) | |||
| 2006 | 2008 | 2009 |
In general satisfied | 13 | 13 | 11 |
Rather satisfied | 41 | 43 | 47 |
Rather dissatisfied | 33 | 33 | 30 |
Completely dissatisfied | 12 | 7 | 8 |
Hard to tell | 2 | 4 | 4 |
In general, are you satisfied with the state of health of your family and close relatives? (close-ended question, one answer) | ||||
| Total respondents | Financial state self-esteem | ||
Very good, good | Average | Bad, very bad | ||
In general satisfied | 11 | 13 | 13 | 6 |
Rather satisfied | 47 | 62 | 49 | 37 |
Rather dissatisfied | 30 | 15 | 28 | 39 |
Completely dissatisfied | 8 | 4 | 6 | 14 |
Hard to tell | 4 | 6 | 3 | 4 |
In you opinion, what is to blame for the poor health state of people? (close-ended question, not more than two answers) | ||
| 2008 | 2009 |
We are to be blamed for our poor health and diseases | 37 | 41 |
Low living standards, lack of financial resources | 41 | 34 |
Poor ecological situation | 25 | 29 |
Low qualification level and inattentiveness of medical workers | 21 | 21 |
Our state is to blame, it does not care about the health of people | 22 | 15 |
No one is to blame, people always get sick | 7 | 10 |
Diseases come from God for our sins | 3 | 2 |
Hard to tell | 3 | 3 |
Note: Using materials from the site www.wciom.ru or www.wciom.com, as well as distributed by VCIOM,
the reference to the source (or hyperlink for the electronic media) is obligatory!