Barsukov, Mikhail

Born Dec. 30, 1889 (Jan. 11, 1890), in Moscow. Historian of medicine; one of the first organizers of the Soviet public health system. Member of the CPSU since 1917.

Barsukov graduated from the department of medicine of Moscow University in 1914. In October 1917, Barsukov was the director of the medical and sanitation department of the Military Revolutionary Committee of the Petrograd Council of Workers’ and Peasants’ Deputies. He was one of the founders of the proletarian Red Cross (1918) and the founder of the All-Russian Federal Union of Medical Personnel (1918). During the Civil War and the military intervention he was vice-chairman of the Council of Doctors’ Collegiums and chief of the sanitary sections of the eastern, southern, and southwestern fronts and of the Western Military District. Barsukov was chief of the Far Eastern Public Health Department in 1923–24 and people’s commissar of public health of the Byelorussian SSR in 1924–30. From 1930 to 1939 he was chief of the public health sector of Gosplan (State Planning Commission) of the USSR. During the Great Patriotic War he was chief of the frontline evacuation centers of the Kalinin and the First Baltic fronts.

Barsukov has been doing scholarly work since 1945; he is the chairman of the All-Union Scientific Historical and Medical Society. His main works deal with the history and theory of Soviet public health and the history of military medicine and the Red Cross. Barsukov has been awarded two Orders of Lenin, three other orders, and medals.