Russia’s Dark Secret: Hepatitis-Stricken Soldiers Sent to the Front Lines

Moscow has a serious shortage of personnel at the front. Now apparently anyone carrying the hepatitis C virus can go to war.

The high losses on the front in the Ukrainian war are apparently forcing Russia to take increasingly drastic measures to resupply its troops. Up to 1,200 soldiers lose their lives in one day; Moscow is said to have lost 615,000 troops since the invasion of Ukraine. According to the New York Times, US experts estimate that 115,000 of them were killed.

So far, ruler Putin has refrained from general mobilization, but he is leaving little stone unturned in sending new men to the front. At first it allowed serious criminals to exchange their cells with the trenches. Now apparently the Russian military is going one step further.

Ukraine’s military intelligence service, HUR, reports that infections with the hepatitis C virus are no longer a reason to reject a soldier’s application. A corresponding order was made by the Minister of Defense of Russia, Andrei Beloussov, reports the Ukrainian “New Voice of Ukraine”.

Recruits would therefore receive vaccination against hepatitis B before deployment and then antiviral drugs against hepatitis C. “According to estimates from the Russian leadership, this new mobilization decision will allow them to use thousands of prisoners in attack missions against Ukraine, ” Ukrainian intelligence officials reported.

Up to 10,000 prisoners are believed to be infected with hepatitis in detention centers and prisons in the Central Military District of the Russian Armed Forces. About 15 percent of them report for military service, according to the Ukrainian secret service. The information cannot be independently verified. Infected companies are to be located in Luhansk and Donetsk.

Hepatitis is passed from person to person through blood, either through unborn babies or through poor hygiene during injections. The latter is particularly common among drug users. “Depending on the virus concentration in the blood, HCV can also be detected in other body fluids, such as saliva, sweat, tears and semen. However, infection through these body fluids is very unlikely,” writes the Robert Koch Foundation . Sexual transmission of HCV is generally possible.

However, the studies carried out so far show that the risk of transmission is generally low. According to the RKI, in around 75 per cent of those affected, the infection develops without any obvious clinical symptoms or is accompanied by only non-specific flu-like symptoms. About 60 to 85 percent of infections become chronic. About 16 to 20 percent of people with chronic hepatitis C develop cirrhosis with progressive loss of liver function after 20 years.

On the war front, the virus could also be transmitted through poorly controlled blood transfusions. Many soldiers are injured by grenades and lose a lot of blood. If blood donations in field hospitals are not adequately screened, the hepatitis C virus could spread rapidly.