Irina Lvovna Dameshek,
Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Irkutsk State University, Irkutsk, Russia, e‑mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Irina Vyacheslavovna Orlova,
Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor, Irkutsk State Medical University, Irkutsk, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Child Mortality in the Irkutsk Province in the 19th – Early 20th Centuries: Medical and Historical Analysis of the Problem
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2024-3-2
The problem of infant mortality in Russia began to be recognized as a serious social problem by the second half of the 19th century. In the 1880s, with the beginning of the development of medical statistics, regional doctors began to include clarifying indicators in vital statistics reports, including data on infant mortality. This prompted medical researchers to study the problem in the regional segment in general, and analyze the causes of child mortality in particular. Based on the results of studies in the Perm and Orenburg provinces, the average mortality rate for children under 5 years of age was determined to be 43.5 %; in Samara province – 42 %; in the Ufa province – 44 %. In the Irkutsk province, infant mortality at the end of the 19th century. was considered from the point of view of medical statistics only in the scope of medical and social institutions (shelters, educational homes, hospitals). At the beginning of the twentieth century. The Russian pediatric scientific school began to take shape, comprehensive statistical studies were carried out in the European part of the country, on the basis of which N.P. Gundobin, the founder of the Russian pediatric school, a member of the council of the Union to Combat Infant Mortality in Russia, provided a consolidated conclusion that in Russia 1,196,000 children do not live to reach the age of 1 year. Such statistics have become an impetus for studying the causes of child mortality. Researchers of the late 19th – early 20th centuries. The main causes of child mortality were epidemics of infectious diseases and unsatisfactory conditions of child care. In this article, the authors analyze the problem of child mortality and the reasons for its permanent existence in the Irkutsk province in the 19th – early 20th centuries, consider in detail the presence of an infectious component in the region, the features of child care, and the level of medical care.
Publishing: 28/06/2024
The article has been received by the editor on 11/02/2024
How to cite: Dameshek I.L., Orlova I.V. Child Mortality in the Irkutsk Province in the 19th – Early 20th Centuries: Medical and Historical Analysis of the Problem // Historical Courier, 2024, No. 3 (35), pp. 24–40. [Available online: http://istkurier.ru/data/2024/ISTKURIER-2024-1-02.pdf]
Links: Issue 3 2024
Keywords: Irkutsk province; infant mortality; demography; infectious diseases; medical institutions; doctors; healthcare