Self-medication in the Gulag

Historians argue about how many millions of our compatriots perished in camps during Stalin's repressions. But we do know that those millions would have been higher if among the prisoners did not come across enthusiastic doctors who managed to somehow treat its neighbors in the barracks, concocting medicines sometimes literally from nothing.




And some of these recipes have been so effective that survived and returned convicts and zechki used them and freedom. So now in the arsenal of our home potions meet periodically develop prison health. Here, for example.

"BLUE YOD" indigestion



A powerful astringent and disinfectant mixture. A spoonful of starch diluted in a glass of water until thick and white and dripping a drop of iodine. The drink becomes blue and disgusting taste. It works perfectly. By the way, the inventor of the recipe we know: it is Doctor of Biological and Chemical Sciences Vladimir Mohnach, sentenced in 1937 to ten years. In the forties, he was able to cope with an epidemic of dysentery in his camp, developed at the request of the camp authorities effective mixture of the available ingredients - iodine and potato peelings, contain a lot of starch

. ASH heartburn



Ignite a piece of birch bark, smear ashes on the crust of bread and eat it all - so create a highly alkaline environment helps to quickly cope with excessive acid secretion. The prisoners in the cells are often used for this purpose, even the ashes from cigarettes. Now activated carbon to combat heartburn and painful sensations in the stomach - an indispensable element of any self-respecting home kit, even the abundance of antacids in pharmacies

. PINE against scurvy



Scurvy - terrible scourge of the prisoners in the north. Drop-down teeth, sores on the gums, fatigue and death - the familiar steps for any goners

. Well, if the brigade was a doctor or a seasoned sidelets: lumberjacks cons get the hand to cook pine needles, making it a terribly bitter liquid which, however, contained some substances necessary for survival, absent from the camp diet, such as ascorbic acid. By the way, this recipe in the besieged Leningrad, too, was in the course of, and saved many lives.

Chifir wound



Strong tea leaves can not only interesting way to influence the psyche - zekami favorite drink is often used as a disinfectant and wound-healing agent. Check somehow: cutting a finger, put it in a strong (! Not sweet) tea solution - healing begins before our eyes

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Even after the reformation of the Gulag with painkillers on areas have always been a serious problem, and dentists there were carried out only occasionally. To cope with an unbearable toothache helped garlic, which is permitted in parcels (unlike dipyrone).

Garlic mashed into mush was applied to the bandage, which attaches to the arm near the wrist. Since our brain starts to get confused, yielding nociceptor (pain) signals from different sources, in most cases, defeated a burning sensation in the wrist, which was much easier to make than exhausting toothache.

Of course, it's still not a reason not to go to the dentist: relief, this method brings only temporary, in addition, garlic is quite is possible to obtain a chemical burn. But if you want prokantovatsya night before the opening of the clinic, you can try it too.