Russians and Vodka

On the 1st January 2010 the Kremlin announced new minimum price standards for vodka that would nearly double the cost of a half litre bottle from $1.69 to $3. And on Wednesday this week Russian President Dimitry Medvedev said that alcoholism has become a national disaster. Downing vast amounts of vodka at one sitting is an integral part of the national culture and in the past, efforts to try and fix it have proved unsuccessful. The reality is that the average Russian drinks about a pint of vodka every day and the life expectancy of a Russian man is only 58 years.

They have announced a ban on spirits between 10pm and 10am from September 1. But even though alcoholics will still be able to drink their vodka in the day and catch up late at night with beer, authorities say the overall alcohol burden will be less.


Australians know all about the problems of alcohol, it's deeply entrenched in our culture too but thankfully, the preferred drink is beer, not vodka. It all started for us in 1793 when an American trading ship arrived with 7,500 gallons of rum on board plus other essential items. The other goods she carried were desperately needed by the colonists but the captain insisted that he wouldn't sell anything until they first bought all his rum. The New South Wales Corps officers' eyes lit up and they formed a syndicate with regimental paymaster John Macarthur at its head, pulling the financial strings to make it possible.


The vast pool of rum flooded the market place at grossly inflated prices and at once became a means of exchange. That's when the New South Wales Corps were dubbed "The Rum Corp" a name that stuck until they were recalled to England in 1810. The rich pickings they made from that first deal gave them the power to monopolise almost all trade, particularly that in rum (the name given to all spirits) for the next 17 years. And ever since alcohol has played an important part in our lives - like our English cousins, Australians love to drink.


So we understand that it's very hard to stop the Russians from drinking vodka. In the 1980s Gorbachev decreed that vodka could only be sold from 2pm to 7pm. Mortality rates dropped but there was an increase in sales in aftershave, shoe polish and window cleaner.

One of the main problems is that vodka is consumed neat and is not diluted with mixers. Distilled from grains or potatoes, it has no real taste, it is not sipped or savoured, in fact there's no real reason to drink it except to get drunk. With an alcohol content of between 40-55% (80-110 proof) it's consumed as a shot usually in the afternoon or evening, followed by a salty snack - fish, pickles, jellied meat or sauerkraut then another shot, another snack, another shot and so on until you eventually end up legless.

And there's a cheaper alternative on offer, it's called Samogen or moonshine vodka. It's got less ethanol than vodka and it's contaminated with other alcohols toxic to hearts and livers.
Aftershave is almost pure ethanol and in Russia it's sold in brightly coloured quarter litre bottles and it's hard not to jump to the conclusion that they are for drinking. Moonshine is distilled using ingredients that produce fatal results and the amount of Russians dying every year from poisonous bootleg vodka is alarming.

Of the many brands of vodka, the most familiar to us is Smirnoff - remember Smirnoff does it? It was once distilled in the USA but the Smirnoff descendents won a court case which gave them sole ownership to the name and since then, it is distilled only in Russia. They became suppliers of vodka to the Romanov tzars.

It's tragic that alcoholism is a national disaser in Russia but we needn't talk. Our young people, especially our young women are lining up shots of straight spirits on the bar when they go out for a night with the girls, many ending up in hospital with alcohol poisoning. Alcohol and drugs are destroying our younger generations and there's not a thing we can do about it, except pray that they grow out of it.