Journalists

24 June 2019

By Zoya Svetova

Source: The World News

This is the story of a woman who was put behind bars, twice, because of some provocation by the police, was then diagnosed with cancer whilst in a pre-trial detention centre, and then passed away in a Moscow hospice three weeks after her release. If the police had not fabricated a drug smuggling case against her, she may have had time to recover whilst free. 

The head of the Moscow palliative care unit, Nyuta Federnesser, called me whilst I was in Vologda, waiting for the court decision regarding Varvara Karaulova. 

From hearing Nyuta’s voice, I understood right away that her request was urgent. She was desperately trying to contact one of the doctors at the Matrosskaya hospital.

She stated that she had read a Facebook post by Eva Merkacheva (deputy chair of the Moscow Public Monitoring commission). She wrote that a woman in the fourth stage of cancer was being held in the Matrosskaya hospital, and was not being administered painkillers. To add to that, the investigator, who could have changed her sentence temporarily so that she could be freely treated, refused to release her. 

Nyuta Federmesser told me that she wanted to take this seriously ill woman to the First Moscow Hospice. It seemed to be that she had already reached an agreement with the top officials of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia, and now all that remained was to talk with the doctors of the Matrosskaya Hospital. 

The next day, Yekaterina Gavrilova was escorted from the prison hospital to the hospice. “We tried to create a precedent”, Nyuta told me at the time. “We will now come up with a way as to how to change this, systematically”. 

It was indeed a miracle. Usually seriously ill prisoners are released from jail, and left to die. Yes, home as in hospital in this case, but it is not known if it’s a good one and whether I’ll be anesthetized there. Katya Gavrilova was escorted to the First Moscow Hospice, which looks nothing like a hospital. 

“People think that being released from prison whilst diagnosed with something fatal is something to be happy about. Where is the happiness here? When Katya came from prison to the hospice, and when the handcuffs were removed and the investigator signed the release papers, her first desire was to get out of the hospice. But she could barely make it to the other room to smoke”…

When I came to the hospice to interview Nyuta Federmesser, she asked me: “Do you want to meet Katya? To talk with her? You better be quick, you haven’t got long”. 

And here I found myself in Katya Gavrilova’s hospice ward. A small woman in glasses, smiling shyly. She lay on some high pillows, on a high bed. She has a cozy, spacious room, a ward, with armchairs, a large window, and a TV. Next to her on the bed was a knitted doll, and she cuddled it like a child. Katya says that she was interviewed by Yury Dud. He is currently making a film about AIDS and drug addicts. 

I return to her in 3 days and bring her another knitted animal- a Peppa Pig. Katya gives me another smile. And we started talking again. She answers my questions in great detail and sincerity. 

It’s a very long conversation, because I understand that there won’t be another one later on. 

I understand that this woman has probably never been happy. She says that she is happy here in the hospice. They are treated humanely. For the first time ever, she is loved. 

“My father hung himself when I was 19 months old.”

-Tell us about yourself

– I was born in Moscow. I’m 38 years old.

-Tell us about your parents

-They both came to live in greater Moscow. Mum’s from Belarus. She had problems with her fiance there. She fled from him to Moscow.

–Was she just as beautiful as you are?

-Beautiful, yes. She was even prettier. I have always admired her figure; her arms and legs. She had graceful, thin wrists. And thin fingers. 

-How old was she when she passed away?

-42, from what I remember. She crashed in a car with a friend. 

-How about your father?

-I was 19 months when he hung himself.

-Why? (did he commit suicide)

-The official version goes that he had “an affair”, caught syphilis, and hung himself.

-So that mum wouldn’t find out?

-Well yeah

-And what did he work as? 

-He worked at a factory, but I don’t know exactly what he did.

-Did your mother not have a profession? 

-She always had different sorts of jobs. She didn’t have higher education.

“Mum’s friend wanted to take ownership of my apartment”

-“How did you become a drug addict?”

-When my mother died, my mother’s friend wanted to take my apartment away from me. She was a very cunning woman. During Soviet times, she was a marketing director. She also served time, and then was released. Her and my mother became friends. And after the death of my mother, there was silence from her friend for a month. Then she calls and says, “You should come over to mine, have some tea, and we’ll have a talk about mother”. Slowly but surely…

-”She gained your confidence?”

–Yes. She then asked me to have her relatives live with me in the apartment. They were husband and wife, and they had nowhere else to live. They lived with me, and after a couple of months, I found out that they were drug addicts. It somehow did not bother me at the time, I just didn’t have time to think about it.

–Why didn’t you go to study (at university) after school?

-I studied at a medical school but I quit soon afterwards because I had to work. In those years, it was difficult for students to fund hourly work, as it is now. In those years you either worked or studied. 

–Whilst you were studying, how did you manage? Did you do well in your exams?

-I was good at school. And these people had helped me settle in. And I also had a period of pure love, it was love at first sight, my first love. And by the way, the same woman introduced me to him (my mother’s friend). 

-Beautiful? You yourself are very beautiful. Did you know that?

-Thanks!

-You’ve got quite the flexible figure.

-I once worked part time with ethnic dances. 

And it turned out that we were parting ways. He left, but he was supposed to return. A month passed, another, and it became clear that he wouldn’t return. To add to that, my grandmother in Belarus is dying. So I go to the funeral. I return, and understand that by and large, I was left alone. I got depressed over this, and I did not want to see anyone. I didn’t want to sleep or eat. And this woman said to me, “Try it out, everything will become easier.”. And they let me try it. And they started injecting me. It didn’t cost me a dime.

Why did they need to hook you up on drugs?

–They were hoping that in another couple of months I would be so out of my mind and delusional that I would sign over ownership of the apartment.

–How did you get rid of them?

-A friend came over to me, shook me by the shoulders and said, “What have you become?!”. I sat and thought about it. I tried to quit, but when you quit, there is depression. I decided to commit suicide. I took 60 tablets. They took me away in an ambulance and placed me in a psychiatric hospital. And when I returned from the hospital, my other acquaintances had already kicked them out of the apartment. 

-How old were you when you started using drugs?

-I started using them early on, when I was about 20. But I used them very sporadically. I could do it three to four times a year, or I could not do it at all for 5 years.

–And then you got HIV?

-Yes. As far as i know, 6 months later, the husband (of the relatives that had moved in) died from HIV.

-You were injected with the same syringe?

–They injected me, and I didn’t even look. I was constantly in a bad state.

COURT: “How will we sentence you? Any kind of purchase is a provocation”

-How did you end up in prison for the first time?

-The first time I ended up in prison was over the same stupidity like now. The girl kept saying, “let’s take you in, let’s take you in”. Turns out they took me in.

-So it turns out that you were jailed for selling drugs?

-No. I didn’t sell. I consumed.

–It turns out that your friend set you up. 

-Yes. She worked with the Drug Enforcement Administration. 

-How long were you given (sentence)

-4 years. I was 29 at the time.

–How much were you caught with?

-0.013 grams.

-Is that a lot?

-It’s not even a significant size. For a person who regularly uses it. 

-It turns out you were sentenced merely for statistics.

-Yes.

-When I was a member of the POC, I often went to the female jail (6), and the head of the jail told us that most of all the women are in jail for drugs. You go into the cell, and it turns out that 40-50 people come to you, serving under Article 228. 

-Yes, there are a lot of druggies serving. But I can say that there are a lot of drug addicts who are substituted for distribution. 

-And at the trial in the first case, it could not be proven that you are selling? 

-I was still searching for the truth. I said to the judge. “Do you realise that this is just a provocation, which in principle is prohibited by law?” The judge responded: “How else do we sentence you? Any test purchase is a provocation.”

-You were 29 years old, and this was your first conviction. Why couldn’t they give you a suspended sentence?

-A suspended sentence was expected, but the judge did not want to issue that. 

-Did you have children then?

-Yes, two.

–Who was the judge?

-It was the Nikulinsky court. Judge Egorova. 

-The namesake of the chairman of the Moscow City Court Olga Egorova. Before your arrest, what were you working as?

-I’ve worked as a saleswoman all my life.

-How old are your children now?

-16 and 17.

“Parole refused for ‘insufficient time spent serving’.

-Where did you serve your sentence?

-In the Oryol region. In the village of Shakhovo. 

-I wrote about Marina Kolyakova. Didn’t you serve with her?

-No, I don’t remember. I was in prison from 2011 to 2013. 

-Marina served eight years for nothing. She was accused of murder, which she did not commit. The court acquitted her twice, but the third judge issued a guilty verdict. Marina spent all her youth in the colony, and when he was released, she contacted a guy, was addicted to drugs. She was jailed for drugs. I went to the Oryol colony to write a report about Marina Kolyakova and about this colony in 2011. I could have bumped into you. Did you work at the colony as a seamstress? There is such terrible slave labour.

-Yes, I worked as that. She was released on parole. 

-That is, after all of that, she was released on parole? I remember Marina explained to me that they were very reluctant to let her go. They didn’t want to let her go either, because she sewed too well. 

– You’ve probably heard that Lyudmila Alpern went there. And I did mediation with her. Alpern selected the best girls and we went to a youngster to engage in mediation . In general, I was engaged in mediation. I was still lucky while I was there, just nearby in the colony an international conference was held, in which I also participated. As a result, the court, which considered my application for parole, refused, and made a very interesting conclusion: to refuse parole due to insufficient time spent.”

– When you applied for parole, did you have two years left to sit?

– Yes, but for the trial there could be still be an insufficient stay, with three months having to be left.

– Why didn’t they let you go?

– First of all, the labour force. I submitted a petition to the administration of the colony, and of course, they didn’t recommend me for parole, I submitted a petition to the court, and naturally they didn’t let me go. I filed a classification appeal with the regional court and it was dropped.

– Did you take part in amateur performances in the colony? Like the one by  convicted Marina Klescheva in Shakhovo. She played the main role in the play “King Lear”. And now she works at “Theatre.doc.”, as well as acting in films.

– Well done! Not everyone knows each other in other zones. Everyone lives their own life. The main thing is to live, the main thing survival

– How much did you leave on parole?

– I left with a year and five months.

– It’s a lot.

– I was the first who left such a term on parole.

– That is, you came out thanks to your perseverance: you filed for cassation, you were not satisfied with the fact that the first court refused you?

– Yes, I had this attitude to write, write, write, till the end.

– Who did your children stay with while you were in the colony?

– The children were sent to an orphanage. And now they are under parent guardianship.

– That is, you were deprived of parental rights?

– Yes.

– And then, when you left, did you reunite with the children?

– I met with them and with the guardian, and we decided that due to other considerations I had better not return back with the children. For one simple reason: it will be cramped for us in my one-room apartment. And if they remain under guardianship, they will now each receive an apartment. The guardian is a very good and very decent woman.

– But you haven’t lost touch with your children, have you?

– Yesterday my daughter was here in the hospice. The day before yesterday she came with Olga, her guardian. She is 16 years old, she studies at school. She’s preparing for exams.

– Who does she want to be?

“She hasn’t really decided yet. Well, first we wanted to go into acting. Then we sat down, thought it through, and decided that economist was a food path, and now a psychologist.

– And the son?

– He’s seventeen. He entered into medicine.

“You’re an outcast. There will always be a stigma”

– When you were released, did you live alone?

– At first, no. At first I was looking for a job, then I worked.

– Is it difficult to find a job when you get out of prison?

– Very hard.

– Was it impossible to return to that store? (where you worked before)

– No. I had to go to the seamstress. After working there for only a month, I left there. The conditions are wild. They have their own team. The volume of work is large. They mainly sewed work uniforms: vests, the simplest cheapest overalls. An acquaintance of mine gave me a job at another “seamstress”, where they sewed leather cases for identification. And I don’t know how to work with leather. I got defects all the time, defects and defects. The boss comes up to me and says: “Sit down, and study.” In 15 minutes another worker comes up to me and gives me those defective pieces of leather. I don’t know where to put them, and I don’t know why they gave them to me. I threw them on top of the bag, even asked her to throw them on top of the bag. And ten minutes later I was called into the office, accused of wanting to steal these pieces of leather. They did so because they knew I was on parole. It was terribly unpleasant. I then called a friend who arranged for me there and explained the whole situation. We have known each other for many years, he, of course, understood that I did not want to steal, but the sediment remained.

– Did you have to leave from there too?

– Yes. Then I found a private shop, they don’t check criminal records. Even in any chain store they check. There is a common base and they have access to a common police base. There were such cases, for example, where I was hired, to work for three or four days, and that’s it. A person from the security service comes and says: “You are not suitable for us.”

– It turns out that you served your time, but you still can’t get a job anywhere. And nobody helps you?

– Not only do they not help, you are an outcast. You are stigmitised. Not only are you not treated normally, you are being looked down upon. And, of course, you are almost always to blame.

– And you were depressed from all this?

– Of course, I tried to get something somewhere. I got along with a man.

– Did you take drugs?

– No. Then I was able to get a job at Pyaterochka. I worked there for a long time. My relationship with the man began to go bad. And he was by nature a tyrant and sadist at home. He lived with me, and when our relationship began to go wrong, I told him to leave. And he began every day, ten times a day, to tell me that I was a drug addict. He said: “You will still be injected, and you will die anyway.” And so he did that every single day.

– He didn’t want to leave? Could you drive him away?

– No, I couldn’t.

– Did you love each other?

– Firstly, physically I was afraid of him. He beat me several times, and threw himself at me with a knife. There was the chance to take him down. But since I myself am a person who has served time in prison, I did not have enough conscience.

-He could have driven you to the point where you could have killed him

– Maybe. But it is what it is. He got his karma too, because when they put me in prison (for the second time), he died. He had a stroke in the summer and was half paralyzed.

“And I was accepted”

 -How did you get jailed a second time?

– If a person is told every day that he is a pig, he will still grunts.

– Have you seen a way out of this situation?

– I did not see a way out of this life situation. It was at work that I met a boy who was injecting drugs. Once he asked to deliver, twice he asked, and then he began to use drugs.

– Did you know that you can go to a human rights organization and complain about this man?

– No, I did not know. It was a vicious circle for me.

– How did you get set up?

– I bought myself drugs for the morning. And the whole evening a boy called me and said: “I feel bad, I feel bad, my wife is bad, I’ve got withdrawal symptoms, help, help.” 

I say: “I have it, do you want me to give it?” He says: “I want it!” But, naturally, I could not give it to him for free, because in the morning I would have to look for money myself.

– So you got involved?

– Yes, I already had withdrawal symptoms. We met with him, and I gave it to him. And I was “accepted”.

– A typical provocation, the so-called test purchase?

– They said that I was a dealer, and I had nothing else with me. If I really traded, in theory I would still have something with me.

– Did they search the house? Didn’t they find anything?

– There was nothing at home.

– How many years have you been at large after your first release?

– Five and a half years.

– And you came to the same section 6 jail?

– Yes, on December 18, 2018.

“At the trial, I explained that I have health problems”.

– Were you healthy before your arrest?

– Nothing bothered me, nothing hurt. I was not as thin as I am now. I was moderately thin. I did not go to doctors amongst all this madness.

– What cell did you find yourself in first?

– In a section for 30 people. Each has its own sleeping place.

-How did you discover that you had cancer?

– I got severe cystitis. I came for the New Year holidays. They’ll give you a couple of packs of medicine, that’s all. I took ten packs. Then the holidays were over, and I went to the gynecologist. He gave other antibiotics. I took other ones too. I come over again, and he gives me the third set of drugs. And the pain continues. I come again and say: “Listen, but this is clearly not cystitis, for one simple reason that if cystitis is not even treated, it will go away by itself in 10 days. And I’ve been having these pains for a month. It hurts.” The doctor promised that he would put me on an ultrasound scan. I waited for him for a month and a half.

– All this time you had pain?

– No, the pains slowly passed. But the liver increased a little. The doctor came, they called me. By our standards, waiting for a doctor for a month and a half is fast. The doctor says: “What are we looking at?” I say: “Well, look at the lower organs and look at the liver at the same time, for some reason I don’t like what i’m feeling.” They looked at the kidney and liver. She said that there might be a cyst in the kidney. I again appointed an ultrasound for Wednesday, so that I was on an empty stomach, because I was pulled from lunch for this ultrasound. On Wednesday I did not wait for an ultrasound, and my kidney hurt more and more. And the stomach began to grow slowly.

– How did the women in the pre-trial detention center treat you, did they regret it?

– It’s every man for himself. I got a lot of gas. I tell the girls: “I can’t do anything, it doesn’t depend on me.” I slept upstairs (, there were no seats downstairs. They endured, and joked. For two weeks nothing happened, the doctor did not call me.

– Have they forgotten about you?

– Perhaps they forgot. They said that then there were problems with the diagnoses for the doctors. I wrote a statement to the infectious disease specialist, but I got to him only after the trial. I wanted to know my immune status. I got severe herpes. Even before my first arrest, I went to the infectious diseases hospital and was diagnosed with HIV there. And I wanted to get the usual acyclovir from the infectious disease specialist.

– You were not registered in the prison for HIV?

– They wrote down that I had HIV, but they give me drugs if I am already on therapy. But in order to start therapy, you need to donate blood.

– This should be done by an infectious disease specialist? Yes? Didn’t he come to you? And did not call you?

– It was in February, and I just had a trial to extend the measure of restraint. At the trial, I tried to explain that I have health problems that cannot be solved at the moment. I cannot get treatment, I cannot see a doctor in the conditions of the pre-trial detention center. And the health problems are serious. Two days after the trial, I wrote a statement to at least prescribe painkillers. I was summoned to the medical unit and told that the Doctor did not like the state of the liver, and they put me in a unit at the Matrossk. I ask: “When did they deliver?” They are: “This week.” On Thursday I had a trial, and on Friday we talk. They say I was put on a stage this week. I would like to hope that this happened precisely because of my words at the trial.

– Something I do not believe in the power of the court.

– Well, thank God, we put it on stage. Then I waited for the stage for two weeks. The infectious disease specialist came, they gave me pain medication. They didn’t give me medicines for HIV, I passed the tests.. And they said to me: “Since you are at the stage at Matrossk, everything will be faster there.” On the second of March, when I was taken to the “Matrossk”, it turned out that the chief doctor of “Matrosskaya” Elena Gennadievna was not there, she was on sick leave. They did all the tests for me, took me for an ultrasound scan, my stomach had already started to grow strongly.

– Are you scared?

– I, let’s say, had other thoughts as to why it is growing.

I thought that maybe the hepatitis had worsened. In the last year, I have had hepatitis. The chief doctor left the hospital, looked at my tests. It seems to me that she immediately began to raise concerns, and began to seek to be examined.

– Did the doctor see something in your analyzes that she didn’t like?

– Well, it’s hard not to see it there.

– So, what next?

– I went to the OKD (oncological dispensary No. 1), donated blood, did a liver puncture, and gastric histology. They immediately saw stomach cancer, but it was somehow misplaced.

– Why did the histology turn out to be some kind of defective each time?

– The puncture was very difficult to take.

– How does this happen? Are they taking a prisoner to an oncological dispensary?

– Yes.

– Are you in handcuffs?

– Yes.

– Do the handcuffs unfasten when they do the procedures?

– Yes.

– When you leave the office, are they handcuffed again?

– Yes.

– That’s bullshit. Where can you run away?

That’s how I laughed about it: “They drove an elephant down the street.” Everyone is watching, going around. Here came the first histology, she came with a marriage. A different histology was required. We drove off. She’s defective again. The deputy head of the department did it for me. The doctor, the head of the department, stood nearby. But again it did not work out to take it normally.

– And therefore, the medical commission could not recognize you as suitable for registration?

– No, the commission admitted that I have cancer. The fourth stage, but when Elena Gennadievna began to contact the investigator (of the Solntsevsky Department of Internal Affairs), she demanded: bring us a clear histology.

– Why was it impossible to release you by court?

– As far as I understand, the release takes place at the request of the investigator, and then the case goes to court. In fact, probably one and a half to two weeks before Nyuta arrived, the doctor Elena Gennadievna had already “stood on her horns”.

– So, your release was due to the persistence of the prison doctor?

– She started really raising the alarms

– And how did you get to the hospice?

– The last week I was there , I just lay (in the intensive care unit). At night I was injected with a strong pain reliever, and during the day I was injected again

– They just didn’t have enough painkillers?

– It didn’t last long. And suddenly Nyuta Federmesser comes (to the hospital She asks: “Do you know what palliative care is?” I say, “I’m not exactly sure. But I remember that something was shown on TV about hospices. ” Nyuta: “Well, what is a hospice in your opinion?” I say: “Home for the elderly, cancer patients.” Nyuta laughed so hard. And she told me that they can take me from the pre-trial detention center to the hospice. Honestly, I would have run right away, but I was worried that Elena Gennadievna (chief physician of the Matrosskaya Tishina SIZO hospital) might have a problem with that.

– Because she treated you badly?

– No, just because she demanded to release me. She casually let slip that she already had problems, she had to unsubscribe (that is, write all sorts of papers, reports). And I was nervous about it. I asked Nyuta if I could think for a while about it. She said, “Okay, have a think about it.” Just then Anya Karetnikova ( analyst of the Federal Penitentiary Service, a former member of the POC of Moscow) came and told me not to be afraid of anything, that this is the best option.

“Home for the elderly, cancer patients”

– Did the convoy go with you?

– Yes, the convoy from Matrosski. There were three of them, and one girl with them. Our convoy did not handcuff me. They understood that they still needed to place me into the car. It’s not that easy. My legs do not rise. I can hardly walk. It is very difficult for me to get up. If I squat down, then will not be able to get up again myself. They pushed me into this car for another half hour. We arrived at the hospice, waited for another convoy, which came from the “six” zone, replacing the convoy of “Matrosskaya Tishina”. So I was constantly under escort.

– And where were the guards?

– In the same room. On this couch, one girl was sitting, and the rest were just in the room.

– Why were there so many?

– In general, four people are supposed to escort and guard. Four people were on duty the first night. Another one stood under the windows, because there are no bars on the windows.

– This is just such nonsense. Are they not surprised themselves?

– In my opinion, they just do not think. I spent the first night in handcuffs. And the hospice staff could do nothing. In the morning they made a “butch”. I don’t know who they got through, where they called. But on the first day the handcuffs were removed from me. The escorts sent a photo report that I was without handcuffs. I could go to the toilet alone. I told the convoy that I was going. She walked with me, stood at the door. The first day she stood with me in the toilet. I told her: “Well, there is no window in the toilet, where am I going to go? Moreover, where am I going? ” But they have their own instructions.

– And when did the investigator come with the release order?

– First, the investigator ordered me to be examined at the clinical infectious diseases hospital. It was an examination by four doctors. We went to the hospital for oncology and HIV. Nyuta made a scandal for them, because there it could last for a very long time, but there the conditions were terrible and there were eight escorts. Thanks to Nyuta, I was examined very quickly. In the afternoon they brought me, at night they began to examine me.

– And what to examine? Do you have histology, biopsy, What else does the investigator need?

– I was quickly x-rayed, ultrasounded, and the surgeon examined. And they confirmed the oncological diagnosis, and in fact, the investigation had no choice.

– They changed the measure of restraint on recognizance not to leave?

– Yes.

– But the investigation is not over, and the case is not closed? No investigative actions are being carried out with you?

– No. In general, my criminal case is, in principle, easy. You need to interview me, find evidence of heroin, a psychiatric examination, and you can close the case and take it to court.

– When you were tried for the first time, did you plead guilty and went in a “special order” without examining the evidence in court?

– Yes.

– And now?

– Now the article that I am charged with is eight years old. And it does not provide for a special order.

– That is, if you were not sick, you could get eight years?

– Yes.

“If it is said that you will rot, you will rot”

 What do you think needs to be changed in prison? In terms of conditions, attitudes towards people and in terms of attitudes towards sick prisoners?

– It all depends on the prison. When I arrived from the “six” to the “Matrossk”, it was heaven and earth.

– That is, it’s better in “Matrossk”?

– A lot.

– In what way?

– There they treat you like a person.

– Does it all depend on people? From employees?

– Not like the staff. It depends on the “regulations”. That is, if it is said to spread rot, they will spread rot. If it is said to treat normally, then it will be normal. People are the same everywhere. But at the “six” we are initially spoken to, although they rarely speak, let’s say. They find fault with absolutely everything.

– Does it come from the management?

– Yes, I think it depends on the leadership.

– Is “Naked Thursday” still practiced in Prison- 6?

– Yes.

– How?

– They lead you out into the corridor. Previously, everyone went out in sheets or towels, naked. Now it is easier in this regard. At one time we could just pull up our pants, show both the belly and the back. Now we have to go out in dressing gowns, open the robe.

– What are they looking for?

– Sort of like bruises.

– And in fact, phones and drugs?

– Well, everyone understands perfectly well that no one can stand either phones or drugs

– Is this a way of humiliation?

– Yes, I think this is one way of humiliation.

– What needs to be changed in terms of the attitude towards patients? So that medical assistance is provided faster? So that people do not wait for months for an ultrasound scan or an appointment with a doctor, infectious disease specialist, gynecologist?

– In the same six, yes. Change so that doctors at least take on time. And again, it is unpleasant when you come to the doctor with some kind of sore, and they say to you: “Why didn’t you get treatment?” It was so with cystitis. I say: “It didn’t hurt when I was outside.” I would like to remove absolutely unqualified paramedics who take on a lot of responsibilities. When I came for painkillers, I was in pain everywhere. Paramedic said to me: “Now we will do no-shpu.” I say: “I don’t need no-shpa, it doesn’t help me. Can I have a normal pain reliever? ” The paramedic tells me: “Judging by where you keep the sore spot, you have pancreatitis, so no-shpa is quite normal.” I explain to her: “Look at my card, I have been prescribed a normal pain reliever.” She: “I will not search now, I have no time. In general, let’s go with an injection of no-shpu. ” I say: “If there is no sense, why inject it?” She: “And I didn’t tell you that it won’t hurt, you just need to relax your muscles.” And that is why it is necessary that such “specialists” be removed from the pre-trial detention center.

– What medicines could this paramedic offer you, besides no-shpa?

– Firstly, I was constantly given ibuprofen or ketarol. And it was easier for her to make no-shpu. She herself diagnosed me based on what sore spot I was holding on to.

“My mother hit me hard. I went all blue “

 Katya, tell me what you did wrong in life? If you could change something, what would you change? Have you thought about it?

– Yes, I have thought about it.

– You give the impression of a gentle person. You do not feel hostility towards the people who set you up with drugs, do not hold anger at the judge. I believe that drug addiction is like a disease, like alcoholism, you cannot be judged for it. You didn’t have the willpower to stop it.

– I’ve always been very soft. I could always be persuaded.

– You are not sure of yourself, you should have run away from that man, go to your friends …

– But it all comes from childhood. I had a very difficult relationship with my mother. She suppressed me since childhood. I do not know why. I sometimes suspect that she gave birth to me in order to keep my father in the family, and since my father still died, she took out all her anger on me. Until the fifth grade, I did not go to school for physical education, because I was all blue. Mom hit me hard. I haven’t lived at home since I was 14. And at the age of 14, let’s say, I was lucky. I met a woman who arranged for me to sell ballpoint pens on the train. I lived with her, started earning, then some other side jobs appeared. Anyway, I was able to become independent.

– This woman became your second mother?

– No, she was focused on herself. She helped me. Then I rented an apartment from friends, lived with friends. And then my mother died, and I began to live in her apartment.

– What would you like to say to your children? So that they don’t repeat your mistakes?

– I tell my daughter about this every time I see her. I say: “Tanya, learn from my mistakes.” But she, thank God, has a firmer character. Her guardian has a large family: her own child and three foster children. It is easier to develop character in a large family. Plus they have an adoptive father – an athlete, they all go in for sports.

– And what do the children call you?

– Now they call it “Katya”.

– And the guardian – “mom”? Does it hurt you?

– At one time it was insulting. And then I thought: “What were you fighting for? Well, who is to blame? “

– Do the children pity you now?

– Yes.

– They probably love you?

– That family brings them up in love, they have a good family.

– Do you have a dream?

– Probably not

Ekaterina Gavrilova, 38 years old, died at the First Moscow Hospice on May 16, after spending less than a month there..

“Katerina died at night. She did not undermine our trust, did not live up to the hopes of those (I hope, trolls and bots) who tried to convince her that using the expensive elite hospice services through clever deception, she would return to her usual criminal business: it is socially dangerous to poison herself with drugs. …

And I will remember you, Katerina. Here I enter the infectious diseases ward, and there you are. You are trying to stand up with such a serious face to meet me, and you cannot hide a smile at my joke. And then, I: Katerina, will you play the fool, or will you go with the doctors to the hospice? Quiet laugh: of course! I’m going!?

We will meet later on, have a laugh and chat.

English translation provided by the author