Ketamine Squad Turns on Doctors Russia

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 13 Jul 2004 - 1:00 PDT


First they went after veterinarians. Now, an army of 40,000 drug enforcement officers is aggressively pursuing and entrapping gynecologists, abortion doctors and detoxification doctors for using anesthetics and other widely accepted medicines.

The worried medical community is accusing the Federal Anti-Drug Service of using technicalities to ensnare doctors while letting harder-to-catch heroin dealers walk free. They say that in a country where drug abuse -- and related health problems like hepatitis and HIV -- are spiraling out of control, the anti-drug agency's efforts are misguided, if not downright dangerous.

"You can't compare doctors with drug dealers," said Yevgeny Chernousov, lawyer for an abortion clinic director who was charged with dealing illegal drugs in January.

"Even if some don't follow the rules exactly, that doesn't mean they are criminals," he said. "What are they supposed to do? Perform abortions without anesthetics?"

The Federal Anti-Drug Service, which has been ordered by President Vladimir Putin to crack down on drugs and answers directly to him, defended its actions and pointed out that there are less than 10 criminal cases pending.

"We have a responsibility to fight the spread of illegal drugs, as well as to control and limit the use of all drugs," agency spokeswoman Maria Lutsenko said.

Tell that to Anatoly Koryabin, the owner and director of the Blagvest abortion clinic who is facing up to 15 years in prison on charges of dealing ketamine, a powerful anesthetic. That is the same drug that veterinarians are being targeted over.

In January, narcotics agents raided Koryabin's clinic, near the Dmitrovskaya metro station in northern Moscow, locking his wife, Valentina Koryabina, a gynecologist, in her office there and combing through medical records and other documents for six hours, Koryabina said.

The agents said the clinic was using ketamine during operations without a proper license, and Koryabin was charged with dealing drugs. If convicted, he faces a sentence of seven to 15 years in prison.

Koryabina called the charges "nonsense" and said the clinic has a valid license to use ketamine. She said Health and Social Development Ministry officials even reassured the clinic many times that the license was good through 2007, even though changes to the law in 2000 required them to apply for a new one, which they did.

Lutsenko, who works at the Moscow branch of the anti-drug service, said, however, that the old license was not valid and that the clinic continued using ketamine while their application was being processed and the new license was not yet approved.

Even if that were the case, Chernousov, the couple's lawyer, said Koryabin should only be facing a fine and no prison time. Continues....The Moscow Times

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