Russian military hospitals unable to accommodate all those wounded in war against Ukraine

In Russia, military hospitals have ceased to cope with the influx of soldiers wounded in the war against Ukraine, prompting authorities to begin converting civilian hospitals, maternity wards and individual medical departments on a mass scale for the treatment of military personnel.

Source: Russian news outlet Novaya Gazeta Europe

Details: Journalists report that following the start of the full-scale invasion, Russian military hospitals ceased to cope with the influx of wounded servicemen. As a result, Russian authorities began building new hospitals, transferring civilian medical facility buildings to the Ministry of Defence and opening special military wards in ordinary hospitals.

One example cited by the outlet is the city of Omsk. At the end of 2025, local authorities there closed a women's health clinic and allocated nearly RUB 2 million (US$28,158) for renovation of the premises in order to transfer it to the Ministry of Defence for use as a polyclinic for veterans of the war against Ukraine.

A maternity hospital had also previously been closed in the city. Staff were informed of a possible closure as early as 2022, after which the legal entity was liquidated. Regional authorities later attributed this to demographic problems and a decline in the number of births. Former employees, however, claimed that approximately 2,500 births took place there annually.

In 2024, RUB 400 million (US$5.6 million) from the federal budget were spent on the reconstruction and equipping of the building. A further RUB 500 million (US$7 million) were allocated from the Omsk Oblast budget. Subsequently, by order of Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, a further RUB 385 million (US$5.4 million) were directed towards equipping the hospital with 513 pieces of medical equipment.

Local activist Daniil Chebykin told journalists that Omsk is effectively being turned into a "capital of military medicine", as the city is located far from the border and Ukrainian drones and missiles cannot reach it. He also suggested that officials have a financial interest in building new hospitals due to the large budget funds allocated to these projects. During the renovation of the Perm garrison military hospital, for example, RUB 35 million (US$492,790) were allegedly stolen according to investigators.

According to the outlet, a similar situation is observed in other regions of Russia. In Moscow, in 2023, the only hospital for people with cystic fibrosis was repurposed as a hospital for war veterans, and in Rostov-on-Don in 2024 a maternity hospital met the same fate.

Journalists also report that due to a shortage of places in military hospitals, many wounded servicemen are being accommodated in ordinary civilian hospitals alongside civilian patients. In St Petersburg, sources told the outlet, wounded personnel are present "in almost every major hospital".

A former nurse at the Dzhanelidze Research Institute of Emergency Medicine in St Petersburg stated that the number of wounded is so great that military hospitals cannot accommodate them.

"They don't talk much about the 'special military operation' personnel because there are so many of them and nobody wants to announce that there are so many of them that the military hospitals can't hold them," the former nurse stated. [Special military operation is the Russian propaganda term for the war in Ukraine – ed.]

She also said that military patients have effectively "consumed almost all the antibiotics and consumables" needed to treat civilians. Some of the wounded were subsequently transferred to a military hospital in Severomorsk in Murmansk Oblast.

"When they were transferred, the ward breathed a sigh of relief because they behaved terribly. Understandably, it is PTSD, but it had gone beyond all limits: they were buying alcohol, deliveries were constantly arriving, the bins were full of bottles and they ignored doctors and nurses."

At the same time, journalists note that Russia is facing a growing shortage of medical workers. In February 2025, Russian Health Minister Mikhail Murashko stated that the country is short of 23,300 doctors and 63,600 mid-level medical staff.

The outlet also cites a message from an Omsk resident who complained that her mother, who had a serious illness, was unable to be admitted to hospital due to a lack of places. According to the woman, the hospital explained this by the large number of military patients.

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