What’s wrong with Vladimir Putin?
The Russian leader’s health has been the subject of
speculation — and denial — for many years.
BY VICTOR
JACK
June 2,
2022 4:00 am
Never
believe anything in politics until it’s officially denied.
And even
then, when it comes to Vladimir Putin’s health, you can still be forgiven for
being at a loss about what to believe, given the bewildering frenzy of
speculation over whether something is wrong with the Russian president.
The rumor
mill about the now strangely puffy-faced 69-year-old has reached such a fever
pitch that Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov this week felt it necessary to shoot
down any suggestion that Putin was sick. “You know, President Putin appears in
public every day. You can see him on the screens, read his speeches, listen to
his speeches,” he said, speaking to French media TF1.
“I don’t
think sane people can discern any sort of symptom of disease in this man,”
Lavrov continued.
Sane or
not, media have for months speculated over the state of the Russian leader,
interpreting everything from his bloated appearance as a sign of steroid-use,
to implying the Russian leader has Parkinson’s and cancer. Video footage
showing Putin fiercely gripping a table while looking uncomfortable during a
recent meeting, making twitchy hand gestures and seeming to limp during
Russia’s Victory Day parade, have only added to this free-for-all among
armchair physicians.
Doctors
have so far argued none of this is strong enough to indicate Putin is ill, and
only an up-close diagnosis could verify the rumors. Intelligence experts have
largely agreed.
In truth,
the rumors must sting for a leader so obsessed with his virile image. Putin has
long attempted to cast himself as a strongman, in every sense of the term. His
displays of hyper-masculinity have become notorious across the world — from
riding on horseback half-naked in Siberia, to firing brand new Kalashnikovs in
Moscow and playing ice hockey with Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko in
St. Petersburg.
But this
game of whack-a-mole around the president’s health — as rumors surface in the
press and the Kremlin scrambles to stamp them out — is nothing new. Here is a
brief summary of the top moments when Putin’s health came into question over
the years, and how the government sought to shut them down.
Sporting tumbles
The
incidents:
Putin likes
to project an image of himself as a keen sportsman, but the reality has not
always gone so smoothly for the Russian leader.
Back in
September 2012, Russian newspaper Vedomosti reported that Putin had hurt
himself during a hang-gliding flight that had exacerbated an injury, sparking
speculation about the leader’s back. After postponing a high-profile foreign
visit and allegedly being seen wearing a back brace, Putin reportedly readied
himself for back surgery.
Generally,
he seems to weather bumps quite well. In 2017, during an ice hockey match,
Putin suddenly fell off his skates onto his back, skidding across the ice with
his feet in the air. And that wasn’t the only time he went down. In 2019 he
face-planted on the ice during a victory lap following a game.
The Kremlin
response:
Amid
reports of the hang-gliding accident in 2012, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry
Peskov told Reuters that Putin did not have a back problem. “This does not
correspond to reality,” Peskov said at the time, insisting he had just suffered
a “sports injury.”
Putin’s
ally Lukashenko later said the Russian president’s back issues stemmed from an
incident related to judo. That only further burnished Putin’s hardman sporting
credentials.
The incidents:
Putin’s
numerous high-level meetings across his gigantic 6-meter-long table have
spurred copious internet memes, but also became a symbol of his hyper-cautious
approach toward COVID-19.
In November
2020, Putin was addressing his finance minister at a virtual meeting about the
coronavirus pandemic when he broke out in a coughing fit. “Excuse me,” he said,
while he attempted to keep speaking.
Then in
September 2021, when dozens in his inner circle contracted COVID-19, Putin was
forced to self-isolate for two weeks, prompting him to enforce draconian rules
for all those who sought to meet him in-person, including mandatory two-week
quarantines.
This
nervousness about sitting too close to interlocutors raised speculation that
Putin could be in a highly vulnerable group, or could indeed fear someone
turning his own tricks against him and exposing him to a lethal toxin.
The Kremlin
response:
The Kremlin
immediately edited out the worst of the coughing fit from 2020 — including the
“excuse me” — but also denied it was serious. “The president apologized and
continued the meeting almost without pausing,” reported TASS.
As for
rumors that Putin’s long table showed his acute fear of contracting COVID-19,
Peskov said the table was an “exclusively epidemiological measure.”
Mysterious
cold
The
incident:
In 2018,
with just one month to go until a crucial presidential election, Putin
disappeared from public sight for two days. After previous wall-to-wall TV
coverage of the Russian leader on the campaign trail, visiting factories and
meeting schoolchildren, he suddenly canceled a string of appearances, including
an event at Moscow’s VDNH exhibition.
The Kremlin
response:
In a rare
admission, Peskov told reporters at the time the president had “a cold” and was
indeed ill. “It’s winter,” he added.
And while
independent Russian outlet TV Rain — which has since been shuttered — found
evidence Putin was also ditching a planned trip to the Far East, Peskov denied
this was canceled, given it had never been announced publicly.
Oncologists
and antler baths
The
incident:
On April 1,
Russian investigative outlet Proekt found evidence that Putin does in fact
suffer from chronic back pain. It also found that an oncologist had visited
Putin 35 times in four years, spending 166 days in residence with him — and
that other specialist doctors who often help diagnose thyroid diseases
including cancer also paid him visits.
U.S. film
director Oliver Stone, who has interviewed Putin several times, told podcaster
Lex Fridman that Putin had battled cancer, but thought he had “licked” it. A
former British spy who worked in Russia for many years, Christopher Steele,
said Putin was “seriously ill” and claimed his disease was “an element” in Russia
invading Ukraine.
On the more
bizarre side of things, the Proekt investigation also alleged the Russian
leader enjoys bathing in blood extracted from Altai red deer horns based on the
recommendation of his now-Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
The Kremlin
response:
This time,
Peskov stepped in again to deny Proekt’s claims more forcefully. On the very
same day the investigation emerged, he called reports that Putin had ever had
cancer or been operated on for it “fiction and untruth.”
“Very ill”
The
incident:
In May, New
Lines Magazine claimed to have got its hands on a hidden recording of an
oligarch “close to the Kremlin” who said in mid-March this year that Putin is
“very ill with blood cancer.” But it remains unclear what exactly the supposed
oligarch’s agenda was — he went on to say “we all hope” Putin dies — or how
close he really is to the president.
The Kremlin
response:
The Kremlin
did not respond directly to the allegations, nor did the New Lines report
discuss whether it had contacted the government for a request for comment.
But New
Lines went on to report that around the same time as the recording was made, an
email was sent to every regional director of Russia’s FSB security service
instructing them not to believe rumors about the president’s “terminal
condition.”
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