Influence of the Crisis on Saint Petersburg’s Public Health and the Goals of Social Policy

Abstract

ABSTRACT The goal of this article is to assess the influence of the 2014 economic crisis on the health of Saint Petersburg’s residents. The conventional hypothesis holds that the crisis negatively affected the public’s health and living environment. This hypothesis was tested by looking at changes in more than twenty public health indicators and factors affecting public health. In order to assess precrisis trends, a linear trend was constructed for each indicator and factor, and extrapolated values were calculated for 2015 and 2016. Deviations from these trends were the main measures of the crisis’s effect on these indicators. This research uncovered negative deviations from the trends of all indicators, but there were especially significant deviations in environmental protection, health care resources, and consumption of a number of foods. It is shown that the city’s current program for health care development has understated target values and does not take into account ecological factors. This reduces its effectiveness as an instrument of regional social policy. The proposed method calculates scientifically justified targets for programs to rebuild the city’s social services.