Moscow residents open homes to psychiatric patients, disabled children

Monitoring Desk

MOSCOW: Moscow resident Arina Muratova knew something was wrong when the messages she received from Nina, a patient at Psychiatric Hospital No.22 who has become a friend during her voluntary work there, suddenly lost their usual, optimistic ring. The hospital had gone into a precautionary lockdown, aimed at preventing the spread of the new coronavirus, and Nina, 26, was feeling more confined than ever.

“They were already living in isolation,” Muratova, who has volunteered for three years at the hospital in the city’s Elk Island park, said. “Now their (living space) had been shrunk to a tiny cube.” Concerned about how fast the coronavirus could spread in the densely populated ward, Muratova decided to use a new government emergency measure allowing people to take residents of state institutions home during the lockdown to get Nina out.

Muratova, a 30-year-old marketing researcher, already had a flatmate, so she moved into temporary accommodation provided by her volunteer group, the Life Route foundation. Nina, who has spent her life in children’s homes and then the psychiatric hospital, moved in with Muratova the next day. With Moscow in a partial lockdown, the two women are self-isolating, and as Nina’s disability means she is not considered to have legal status, they are unsure how to register her for a digital pass allowing some excursions outside.

“So right now we are sitting in pretty strict self-isolation. All our groceries are delivered, everything we need is contact-free delivery and we don’t go outside,” Muratova said on a call, adding the plan is to do so at least until July. “The main thing for me is that I can be with a girl friend here,” Nina, also on the video call, said. They are cooking together and finding activities for Nina to do, Muratova said, adding that Nina was enjoying having her own space for the first time and being able to take showers alone, rather than in groups. “All over the country, institutions house hundreds, sometimes thousands of people in one place … If one gets sick with coronavirus, so will everyone else,” Lida Moniava, director of a Moscow children’s hospice, said. (Reuters)