Survey reveals that one third of Russians are coronavirus skeptics

One third of Russian (32.9 percent) think the coronavirus pandemic is either a fabrication, or that the disease is harmless to humanity, according to the results of a new survey published by RBC.

The survey, conducted by the Directorate for Expert Analysis at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics (HSE), revealed that 23.2 percent of respondents think that the COVID-19 pandemic is a “fiction” invented by “interested parties.” Another 9.6 percent of respondents said that the threat of the coronavirus has been exaggerated.

Among those who do not believe in the pandemic, 43 percent said that they have continued to visit their relatives, and 54 percent have continued to go out for walks. What’s more, around 74 percent of skeptics said that the self-isolation regime was unnecessary.

The survey was conducted via the internet between March 18 and May 26, and collected responses from more than 30,000 people across Russia, between the ages of 20 and 60 years old.

The majority of the so-called “covid dissidents,”41 percent, were residents of Russia’s Southern Federal District.

On the morning of May 28, Russian officials announced that the country had recorded 8,371 new coronavirus infections in the past day, bringing the nation’s total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases to 379,051 patients. As many as 150,993 people in Russia are known to have recovered fully from COVID-19, including 8,785 in the past day. In the last 24 hours, another 174 people reportedly died from the disease, raising Russia’s total number of fatalities officially caused by coronavirus to 4,142.