The Experience of Russian Railways in the Fight Against Epidemics in the Pre-War Years and in 1941–1945: Specialized Trains

Abstract

Issues of sanitary services for regular army soldiers become especially important during combat operations. By solving these problems, the command prevents or stops outbreaks of infections in the armed forces, has a positive impact on the health and psycho-emotional state of military personnel, and at the same time, on the combat effectiveness of the army. At the same time, we note that researchers of the Great Patriotic War assign secondary importance to the issues studied in this article. The above thesis is confirmed by a very limited range of sources and literature on the work of bath and laundry disinfection trains (BLDT), which served officers and soldiers of our army in 1941–1945. The presented work is a continuation of a series of scientific articles devoted to the study of sanitary and medical services of the Red Army on the eve and during the Great Patriotic War. The research aims at recreating an objective picture of the past, taking into account the information that has become available in the last decade on the work of domestic railway transport during the period under review. Taking into account the relevance of the issues under study, in many ways the unique experience of using the category of these trains can be used in our time.