MOSCOW, October 10 (Itar-Tass) — Russia’s ex-finance minister Alexei Kudrin insists that the country should invest more money into healthcare and less into defence.
“Russia still has to go down the path of increasing expenditures on healthcare. In this respect I would inject less into military needs than into healthcare,” he told the forum dealing with the Sixth Millennium Development Goal MDG-6 that opened in Moscow on Monday.
He reiterated his position saying that “an increase in military spending poses a threat to the support and development of healthcare and education programs.” “This is the reason of my conflict with the Russian incumbent president.”
In late September Alexei Kudrin resigned after a disagreement with President Dmitry Medvedev’s economic policy targeted at increasing expenditures on defence.
Speaking about reaching the development goals, mainly the goal to combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, Kudrin stressed the need for creating a mechanism that would attract large pharmaceutical corporations to work in less developed countries and for the poor, as well-to-do people have access to most state-of-the-art medicines.