“Get drunk in three pubs”: residents of the most drinking region of Russia described the situation

The leader of the Sober Russia movement, State Duma deputy Sultan Khamzaev presented the rating of the most “drinking” regions of the country in 2022. The second and third places were taken by Chukotka and the Kurgan region, and Sakhalin took the sad “palm”. Moscow and St. Petersburg in this rating were in 18th and 12th place, respectively. Residents of the most “drinking” regions admitted to “Moskovsky Komsomolets” that alcoholics are terribly tired of them, but nothing can be done with drunkards. There is nowhere to code, and sobering-up stations have long been closed.

The small town of Uglegorsk on Sakhalin was once regarded as the capital of the entire region. Now the city, known for its coal industry, is going through hard times.

Local resident Lyudmila Anikeeva, who became famous for many years of fighting with officials to get a normal apartment instead of dilapidated and dilapidated housing, told MK how things really are with drunkenness in their city.

According to Lyudmila, there are no sobering-up stations in Uglegorsk for a long time, and alcoholics do not hesitate to “dry out” on benches in the summer right in front of children and passers-by, but in winter they move much warmer – to the stairwells in the entrances.

“In Uglegorsk, people really began to drink more,” the woman says. – We have a big problem with alcohol. In order not to drink, you need to create jobs, but in our city there is practically no work, a lot of quarries have closed, only the Solntsevsky Coal Mine remains, but only those who are educated work there.

We have no agriculture, the Uglegorskiye Novosti newspaper was recently closed, newspapermen were fired, about twenty people were left without work. Doctors leave hospitals, work for six months and leave.

For many in life, everything is so bad that they reach for a glass, only in this they find themselves. We have a neighbor in our house who is an alcoholic. Once he worked at a meat-packing plant, then the enterprise was closed, after that he took to drink and now he completely drank himself. Many such families and very many die from alcohol.

Are there many places in the city where you can buy alcohol?

– We have three pubs. Get drunk, behave disgustingly. And even women. Recently there was a case when during the day the drunk turned on the music on the playground and drank to it right there. A neighbor reprimanded him and was stabbed. Living next to such people is scary, there are many of them in Uglegorsk, and something must be done. I don’t know how to deal with this situation. They need to be treated, but we do not code. We only have a psychiatric hospital, where violent people can be taken, dripped, held, and that’s it.

– Ahead of the New Year. What will happen during the holidays?

– Not a single New Year passes without incidents and without fights. They get drunk, they don’t follow safety precautions – they are the smartest, most courageous, and then someone is left without a finger, someone without an eye.

The small town of Shakhtyorsk is slightly smaller than Uglegorsk in terms of population, but it is not going to lag behind in terms of the level of drunkenness. Young people start with light tonics and energy drinks, and then move on to something heavier. According to local residents, drunken women in the city are no less than men, if not more. And in this form, they do not hesitate to walk down the street and buy from everyone in plain sight “alcohol additive” in shops and kiosks.

Things are also bad in the regional capital, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk.

Anna, a resident of the city, believes that the cause of drunkenness is a disease of society. “Young people at the age of fourteen are already sick, young guys are already accustomed to the form of recreation with alcohol,” the girl shared her thoughts with MK. – Trained that Friday is a drunkard. Even the alcohol market in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk is called Pyatnitsa, and there are a lot of such shops in the region.

On the last day of the working week, after work, almost all the men go to buy alcohol and drink until the end of the weekend – for two days. They relax like that, because they don’t really communicate with women, they don’t realize themselves as men. They do nothing physically.

And alcohol is now so poisonous that it causes a terrible addiction. You just need to drink something before shaking, or at least hold the bottle in your hands.

There is also advertising – go to any alcohol market and you will see this abundance of taste. There is poison for every taste and color, in beautiful wrappers and bottles. And the more beautiful the packaging and the bottle, the higher the rating. And we have no restrictions – as much as you want, drink and walk as much as you like. That is why our youth sits in nightclubs for days on end.”

“At least somewhere we are in the top,” Mikhail, a resident of Chukotka, jokes sadly. His native land took second place in the list of the most drinking regions of the country. “Well, what do you want,” the man thinks, “when in cities there are pubs on every corner, they will go there to rest. There are always a bunch of alcoholics around these points, and now we have also opened alcohol stores. And in the Kurgan region, probably the same, since they are in third place in this rating.