Russia has admitted that the number of deaths from COVID-19 is three times higher than previously reported, making it the country with the third highest number of fatalities due to pandemic.
Experts have long doubted President Vladimir Putin’s repeated claims about a low mortality rate from the virus, which boasted of showing that Russia was doing a “better” job in crisis management than Western countries. .
Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova proved on Monday that critics were right, as she revealed that the actual number of deaths was probably 186,000, not the 55,000 officially reported.
Golikova made the revelation after the statistical agency Rosstat said deaths between January and November had increased by 229,700 compared to the previous year.
“More than 81 percent of this increase in mortality during this period is due to COVID,” Golikova said, according to Agence France-Presse.
The new figure means the country’s death toll is the third highest in the world, behind the United States with more than 335,000 deaths and just behind Brazil with 191,000, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
So far, Russia has only stopped having nearly 3.1 million confirmed infections among its population of 144 million.
Putin, 68, made it clear that he now plans to get his country’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, a month after saying he would not get the shot.
With publishing cables