The views of scientists-police officers on the problem of epidemic prevention

Biyushkina Nadezhda Iosifovna Doctor of Law Professor, Head of the Department of Judicial and Prosecutor's Activities, Nizhny Novgorod State University. N.I. Lobachevsky 603950, Russia, Nizhny Novgorod region, Nizhny Novgorod, Gagarin Ave., 23 Asya_biyushkina1@list.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction.

Epidemic threats do not lose their relevance from century to century. Each new epoch is marked in this regard by specific large-scale diseases that claim thousands and hundreds of thousands of lives. At the same time, another epidemic has its own characteristics, before which society turns out to be powerless, and medicine, despite all its achievements, does not have an arsenal of effective means of successfully combating mimicking mass diseases.

In these conditions, the state and its imperious dictates acquire special importance and a leading role in countering and combating epidemics, organizing a health system focused on eliminating the epidemic threat. The increasing role of the statist principle with the active assistance of the population as a guarantee of successful confrontation with the threats of mass mortality from epidemics has been emphasized by public and state figures since the XVIII century.

Discussion and results.

Both German and Russian political scientists wrote about the need for centralized state organization and legal regulation of preventive measures aimed at countering the spread of epidemic diseases that pose a threat of mass destruction of the population. The authors emphasized the importance of developing and applying a set of tools, starting from disease prevention, and with the development of medicine – mass vaccination, including the organization of quarantine, isolation measures designed to localize the foci of diseases that have already arisen.

Through the efforts of the state, as indicated by the police researchers, a system of professional development of medical personnel should be established to acquire the necessary knowledge, skills and abilities to more effectively combat epidemics, and ultimately - the inadmissibility of the recurrence of similar threats.

At the same time, political scientists assigned a special role to the state in the person of its organs and officials, rightly believing that social Darwinist ideas about a self-governing social organization capable of progressive development independently of the state, in the face of the danger of mass destruction, appear powerless, harmful to the development of a society that is unable to protect the main values – life and health in conditions of epidemic threat. For example, Mr. Spencer emphasized that "the state exists for the benefit of citizens... the freedom of a person is sacred and should be limited only by the same freedom of other persons; that the legislative power has no right to subject it to any further restrictions: it cannot prohibit any actions permitted by the law of equality of freedom for all, and cannot charge people anything except what is necessary for the expenses required by the protection of this law... that the only function of the state is to protect people from each other and from a foreign enemy. Throughout the civilized world," he continues his reasoning, "there is a constant obvious tendency to expand the freedom of the individual and limit the functions of the state; therefore... the final political state should be one in which personal freedom is expanded to the utmost extent possible and government power is reduced; that is, one in which the freedom of each person has no border, except for the same freedom of all, and the only duty of the government is to protect these borders" ^{[1, C. 5-6]}.

The diametrically opposite position was held by political scientists. Thus, Robert von Mol in his works repeatedly pointed out the urgent need to organize, by the forces and means of the state, a system of bodies based on bureaucratic police principles with the participation of representatives of the medical profession.

Another researcher, the political scientist Lorenz von Stein, philosophically defended the idea of the need to strengthen the state, its power, and capabilities, because only through its efforts it is possible to protect and protect both socio-economic and political rights and legitimate interests of citizens, including from all kinds of threats of an internal and external nature. In his work "The History of the social movement of France," he wrote: "... the more in the state... healthy and strong personalities, the stronger it is. Conversely, if the amount of mental, physical and material wealth belonging to citizens decreases, then the importance of the state also decreases. The more insignificant its citizens are, the more insignificant it is; the less developed they are, the less developed the state itself is... the highest development of the state can be achieved only when the state, with the help of its supreme authority, will contribute to the development, i.e. progress, wealth, power and intelligence of all individuals: acting for the benefit of all, it acts for its own benefit. There is no other way for him, because the state is nothing but the unity of all individuals" ^{[2, C. XXVIII]}.

Russian pre-revolutionary authors who held similar views and continued the traditions of European political science have repeatedly noted the special role of the state in preventing the ever-increasing epidemic threat. It is characteristic that their views on this issue were in the context of the state and legal policy pursued by the Russian sovereigns, who took targeted organizational and regulatory measures to prevent epidemic danger. Researcher E. V. Melnik clarified that the first mentions of epidemic prevention were noted "in 1352 in Novgorod" ^{[3, C. 156]}. K. G. Vasiliev and A. E. Segal, describing this fact, stressed that "... in connection with the plague epidemic, the townspeople asked Vladyka to "charge bonfires in Orekhov""" ^{[4, C. 31]}. It is, apparently, about anti-epidemic measures related to air purification by fire.  The prevention of various diseases should include the customs and traditions of observance of sanitary and hygienic standards established in Russia and in Russia, which provided for the mandatory presence of baths in both urban and rural areas and regular visits to them, accompanied by a change of clothes. Urban planning, unlike in Western Europe, was characterized by significantly large distances between houses and other buildings. All this contributed a lot to the prevention of epidemic diseases.

Along with the ancient customs, the supreme power was also aware of the danger of mass infection and, in turn, took all possible measures to counter this threat. Ivan the Terrible, by his command, facilitated the opening of the first royal pharmacy in 1581, "serving the tsar, his family and the royal court" ^{[4, p. 35]}. In 1672, by decree of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, the second pharmacy for all those in need began its work, establishing a state monopoly on the trade in medicines.

 On June 8, 1676, a personal decree was issued by Tsar Fyodor Alekseevich, announced on the Bed Porch to the Stewards, Solicitors, Moscow Nobles and Residents, "On the unwritten expression in requests to the Emperor, so that he would grant mercy like God, and so that officials whose houses would open contagious diseases would not accompany the Emperor on His campaigns and they did not appear on the Bed Porch", where it was prescribed to persons of various class affiliation from stolnikov to posadsky people to observe quarantine measures in case of infection with dangerous diseases on pain of confiscation of all property to the sovereign's treasury "... and for such their fearless audacity and for not protecting His Sovereign's health, to be in great disgrace, and others and in punishment and ruin, without any mercy or mercy, and their estates and patrimony will be taken over by Him, the Great Sovereign, and given away irrevocably" ^[5].

From this it can be seen that in Russia and historically, preventive customs have developed, supported by the state will, aimed at countering the epidemic threat.

At the same time, until the middle of the XIX century, when the Russian science of police law was in the process of formation and could not systematically influence legal regulation. The adopted normative acts, which established the rules of behavior of subjects in the conditions of epidemics, were largely forced response measures of a situational nature. While since the second half of the XIX century. with the development and achievement of the heyday of Russian policeistics, the legislation in force in Russia, establishing rules for prevention, methods of combating and eliminating the consequences of epidemics, acquired a systematic codified character and was expressed in the adoption of the Medical Charter, the first edition of which dates back to 1857 and is contained in the XIII volume of the Code of Laws of the Russian Empire ^[6]. This fact convincingly testifies to the positive impact of scientific achievements in the field of policeistics on the views of those in power and, as a result, the achievement of a better qualitative level of legislation regulating both the internal organization of medical institutions aimed at implementing a set of effective measures to counteract, combat and eliminate the consequences of epidemiological threats, and providing for a set of "general measures to protect the health of the people" ^{[7, pp. 163-164]}.

In turn, the adoption of a codified act regulating the organization, forms and methods of prevention and control of the epidemiological threat in 1857, with subsequent revisions, confirmed the truth of the reasoning of the founders of policeistics and gave a new impetus to the development of their views to domestic authors who shared the views of European cameralist scientists. So, in the second half of the XIX – early XX centuries, such fundamental works in the field of the science of police law in Russia appeared as "Police Law" by N. N. Belyavsky, "Police Law" by V. F. Deryuzhinsky, "Textbook of the Science of Police Law" by I. T. Tarasov, etc. Russian police officers, developing a strategy and tactics for the application of preventive measures to combat mass diseases, were guided by the provisions formulated by German scientists who stood at the origins of cameralistics. Indeed, in his writings, R. von Mol emphasized that "... the elimination and removal of the causes of the disease... – represents ... a particularly important task of the medical police. The measures that the State should take in this regard ... can be summed up from two points of view. One... It is aimed at the complete removal of the cause of the disease ..., and the second consists of those means that, although they do not weaken the cause of evil, they protect an individual with more or less success" ^{[8, pp. 161-162]}.

I. E. Andreevsky, a professor of policeology, classified mass diseases in his works by the causes of their occurrence, distinguishing hereditary and acquired ones. The latter, in turn, were divided into those obtained in utero or at birth, as a result of the negative effects of the environment, poor nutrition, poisoning and epidemics. The issues of preventing mass infection occupied a special place for the author. He noted that "the general measures set out in the codes in the form of instructions for the activities of both the executive police and the medical police are mainly meant for individual localities, in case it would not be possible to stop infections from another state. These measures relate to ... sticky diseases ... becoming epidemics" ^{[9, C. 375]}. The author differentiated the preventive actions applicable to any epidemics and specific types of mass diseases, distinguishing their goals. "General measures in relation to common diseases," he wrote, "... are aimed at: 1) to receive timely news of the appearance of the disease and have accurate data on its course; 2) to stop the disease in the area where it opened and 3) to provide both the sick and generally cordoned off with proper medical care and to deliver food supplies" ^{[9, C. 375]}. Regarding each specific epidemic disease, the author proposed the prompt application of a set of preventive measures carried out jointly by bodies and officials of the executive and medical police, aimed specifically at countering this massive disease.

The problem of studying the causes of epidemics was in the field of view of another Russian political scientist, N. N. Belyavsky. He noted such dangerous factors as air, water, soil pollution, violation of the rules of burial, waste management. In this regard, he wrote about preventive measures to counteract the occurrence of epidemics. Russian graves The author emphasized that "it is desirable to teach the dark mass of the Russian people the basic rules of hygiene and the fight against infectious diseases that prematurely take a huge percentage of the population to the grave" ^{[7, p. 158]}. The author assigned a significant preventive role to environmental protection issues. He pointed out that "to ensure the cleanliness of the air in cities, the issue of how to remove sewage is extremely important... the soil itself can serve as a source of infection..." ^{[7, C. 163]}. At the same time, the researcher noted unresolved problems at that time, determining possible prospects for the development of current legislation on this issue: "... the issue of sanitation has not been fully investigated, and therefore has not yet received a certain legislative regulation" ^{[7, p. 163]}.

The author assigned significant importance in the prevention of urban epidemics to the action of sanitary norms related to maintaining cleanliness and landscaping of the urban area: "in the interests of public health, it is necessary to take care of the sanitary maintenance of the city in general, for example, to clean streets and squares from litter, all carrion, dust, ... even more important in the sense of preventing diseases is the removal beyond the city limits of industries that spoil the air, pollute water, cause concern to residents, etc." ^{[7, p. 163]}.

Since the issues of preventing the epidemic threat should be, as the author rightly noted, of a complex nature, without adopting special norms regulating, in particular, the rules of burial, they should be centrally regulated. N. N. Belyavsky, arguing about the importance of observing sanitary and epidemiological norms, referred to the legislation in force at that time, namely The medical charter of 1857, in which articles 704, 713 indicated that "for urban cemeteries, places are allocated outside the city, on pasture land, in convenient places, with a distance of at least one hundred fathoms from the last urban dwelling" ^{[6, C. 262]}. In 1871, "Special rules on the arrangement of cemeteries in St. Petersburg" were issued. A similar act was adopted in 1846 in the provinces of the Kingdom of Poland. According to Article 705 of the Medical Charter of 1857, rural cemeteries "are arranged no closer than half a mile from the villages ..." ^{[6, C. 262]}. In Article 713 of the Medical Charter of 1857, it was forbidden "to bury the dead before the expiration of three days upon death certificate, if death did not follow from the plague, or any other contagious disease, such as rotten and clinging fever, smallpox, measles and scarlet fever; in these cases only, in order to prevent the spread of infection among the living, it is allowed to begin burial before the specified time"^{[6, C. 263]}. At the same time, the Medical Charter of 1857 contains references to earlier acts dated 1704, 1819 and 1830. According to Article 722 of the Medical Charter of 1857, "corpses should be buried as deep as possible, so that the depth of the pit was at least two and a half yards" ^{[6, C. 263]}, while The legislator refers to the law of 1808. It should be noted that the opinion of N.N. Belyavsky regarding the need to comply with sanitary and epidemiological standards fully coincides with the legal position of the legislator on this issue. It follows that the science of police law and the current legislation establishing sanitary and epidemiological standards aimed at preventing diseases of mass distribution had a common focus.

Separately, N. N. Belyavsky stressed the need to organize and carry out comprehensive measures to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, in particular, syphilis, which posed a threat of mass infection. Unlike epidemics such as smallpox, plague, and cholera, which are of a deadly but temporary nature, syphilis was an incessant, ever-increasing danger that awaits every person who, willingly or unwittingly, was infected. The author wrote about this: "In the interests of all mankind, it is necessary to take the most vigorous measures against the spread of syphilis as a hotbed of moral and physical degeneration... Preventive measures against syphilis, he continues, are closely related to the issue of regulating commercial debauchery as the main source of infections. This regulation is expressed in the organization of sanitary supervision of houses of tolerance, etc. secret prostitution" ^{[7, C. 181]}. It cannot be said that the state did not realize the threat of infection with sexually transmitted diseases. Thus, in 1843, N. N. Belyavsky noted, "medical and police committees were established in both capitals, Vilna, Riga and Nizhny Novgorod for the medical examination of prostitutes" ^{[7, p. 181]}. The law required persons leading an appropriate lifestyle to undergo regular medical examinations. The author pointed out that "... On October 8, 1903, the Minister of the Interior issued a new Regulation on the organization of supervision of urban prostitution in the Empire" ^{[7, C. 182]}. Positively assessing this departmental act, he stressed that "... our law tries to open secret foci of infection. Those who benefit from a contagious disease in hospitals are interrogated from whom they became infected..." ^{[7, p. 183]}. The particular danger of the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, on the one hand, was explained by the lack of effective medical means and ways to both prevent infection and its further spread and control it. On the other hand, it is necessary to state the fact that, despite the officially dominant Christian and other religious worldview in society at that time, the physical and moral decomposition of the population actually flourished. The corresponding lifestyle was mainly characteristic of the townspeople, whose social environment, to a greater extent than the rural community organization, contributed to spiritual and moral degradation.

N. N. Belyavsky attached great importance to preventive measures to prevent the spread of smallpox disease. In this regard, he drew attention to the history of the issue, pointing to the fact that "in Russia, concerns about smallpox vaccination began with Catherine II, who inoculated herself and the heir to the throne with smallpox for a clear example to her subjects" ^{[7, C. 185]}. He noted the effectiveness of the promotion method for wider dissemination of vaccination and revaccination. So, he wrote: "The Russian government adheres to the incentive system in relation to smallpox vaccination, taking all possible measures to spread vaccination to the masses, insisting on revaccination in case of epidemics" ^{[7, p. 185]}.

A common position on the prevention of mass diseases, carried out primarily by the forces and means of the state with the support of various social corporations and groups, is characteristic of representatives of the Russian science of the police state and law in general. Thus, the author of the textbook "Administrative Law" V. M. Gessen formulated the subject of the sanitary and medical police, understanding it as "taking care of people's health in the broadest sense of the word. Disease is a social evil, because its consequences are of a social nature" ^{[10, C. 117]}. If the subject is indicated in general for both the sanitary and medical police, then the author differentiated the tasks and noted that "the task of the sanitary police is to prevent the possibility of diseases, i.e. to create conditions of people's life conducive to people's health. The task of the medical police is to combat an existing disease" ^{[10, C. 117]}. From this it can be seen that the scientist entrusted the implementation of preventive measures to the sanitary police, and directly countering the already existing epidemic to the medical police.

A contemporary of V. M. Hessen, a political scientist V. F. Deryuzhinsky, provided interesting statistical data indicating the importance of preventive sanitary measures aimed at preventing epidemics: "According to the data of the 90s of the last century, smallpox, scarlet fever, diphtheria and croup, measles, whooping cough and typhoid fever per 100,000 inhabitants died in Russia - 555 people per year; the corresponding figures in England – 145 people, in Sweden – 143 people, in Holland – 125 people" ^{[11, C. 308]}. The statistics presented in relation to the XIX century convincingly demonstrates the insufficiency of preventive anti-epidemic measures taken by Russian society and the state, and proves the unresolved multidimensional problems associated not so much with imperfect legislative regulation, but with improper implementation of prescribed norms as a result of both objective and subjective factors. The first ones include the vast expanses of the Russian Empire, limited transport, information, medical and preventive provision of the regions. The second group of factors was expressed in the unwillingness of the population, which was mostly illiterate and guided by everyday ideas and religious feelings, to assist the executive and medical police, which already had a very archaic arsenal of tools necessary to effectively counter epidemics.

Conclusion.

Thus, the analysis of the views of political scientists on the problem of preventing the spread of mass diseases allows us to conclude that the authors, who represented the school of cameralists, in their writings summarized the rich experience of countering the emergence of epidemics, developed spontaneously by society itself in Russia and in Russia, and arose as a result of state-governmental influence, expressed as in separate decrees, as well as in codified acts. As a result, representatives of the science of police law and the state in their writings came to the indisputable conclusion about the special importance of the state in addressing the issues of countering the epidemic threat. It is noted that such bodies as the executive and medical police should play an avant-garde role in the development and application of operational comprehensive measures of both local and national anti-epidemic nature, mandatory for all persons, regardless of class and other affiliation. This approach has not lost its relevance at the present time, regardless of the ideological, political and other attitudes prevailing in a particular society and state.