BackgroundSelf-rated health (SRH) has been widely studied to assess health inequalities in both developed and developing countries. However, no studies have been performed in Central Asia. The aim of the study was to assess gender-, ethnic-, and social inequalities in SRH in Almaty, Kazakhstan.MethodsAltogether, 1500 randomly selected adults aged 45 years or older were invited to participate in a cross-sectional study and 1199 agreed (response rate 80%). SRH was classified as poor, satisfactory, good and excellent. Multinomial logistic regression was applied to study associations between SRH and socio-demographic characteristics. Crude and adjusted odds ratios (OR) for poor vs. good and for satisfactory vs. good health were calculated with 95% confidence intervals (CI).ResultsAltogether, poor, satisfactory, good and excellent health was reported by 11.8%, 53.7%, 31.0% and 3.2% of the responders, respectively. Clear gradients in SRH were observed by age, education and self-reported material deprivation in both crude and adjusted analyses. Women were more likely to report poor (OR = 1.9, 95% CI: 1.2-3.1) or satisfactory (OR = 1.6, 95% CI: 1.2-2.1) than good health. Ethnic Russians and unmarried participants had greater odds for poor vs. good health (OR = 2.3, 95% CI: 1.5-3.7 and OR = 4.0, 95% CI: 2.7-6.1, respectively) and for satisfactory vs. good health (OR = 1.4, 95% CI: 1.1-1.9 and OR = 1.9, 95% CI: 1.4-2.5, respectively) in crude analysis, but the estimates were reduced to non-significant levels after adjustment. Unemployed and pensioners were less likely to report good health than white-collar workers while no difference in SRH was observed between white- and blue-collar workers.ConclusionConsiderable levels of inequalities in SRH by age, gender, education and particularly self-reported material deprivation, but not by ethnicity or marital status were found in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Further research is warranted to identify the factors behind the observed associations in Kazakhstan.

The authors attempt to conduct interdisciplinary research in epidemiology demography and pension economics. A literature was selected upon its relevance to the following key words: COVID-19, ageing and retirement system. The following methods are used: Historical content analysis, information, and analytical, comparative analysis. The analysis part is mainly based on secondary data of Committee on Statistics of the Republic of Kazakhstan and world recognized institutions’ reports such as World Health Organization, United Nations and World Bank. In the demographic analysis the traditional and alternative indices of population ageing such as Old Age Dependency Ratio (OADR) and Prospective Old Age Dependency Ratio (POADR) were widely used. By August 5, 2020, Kazakhstan has 94,882 registered cases of CVI, 67031 people recovered and 1058 deaths. Confusion in the demographic statistics of COVID-19 cases showed all the shortcomings. Even though the OADR and POADR ratios are rising in accordance with UN forecast, the global pandemic will adjust the population ageing, since the mortality of the elderly population from this disease is higher than in other age groups. The Kazakhstani retirement system has been suffered by the COVID-19 as well. Human losses, income poverty and increase in pension costs put a burden on state budget. The research presents recommendations on supporting measures in several directions that need to be taken by policy makers during post COVID-19 period in retirement system.

Background. The industrial city of Zhezkazgan is one of the most important cities in the industrial sector and the most polluted city in the Republic of Kazakhstan. There is placed Kazakhstan’s largest copper smelter. The entire technological process (extraction, crushing, grinding, purification, and smelting of pure ingots) of the production of the copper smelter releases into the environment mainly various kinds of solid particles, sulfur oxides (SOx), and various carcinogenic elements. Emissions from the industrial facilities extend to a significant area around the city, combined with other sources of environmental pollution (motor transport, thermal power plant, individual heating systems, and others). Objective. This study assessed the health status of residents of villages near Zhezkazgan by screening, quality of life studies, and official medical statistics. Methods. This study assessed the health status and quality of life of residents near Zhezkazgan city. The cohort included residents from Talap village (main group) and Malshybai village (comparison group) from the Ulytau district in the Karaganda region. The sampling for the health check and quality of life survey covered 260 adult residents of Talap village and 146 adult residents of Malshybai village. Univariate analysis was used to calculate the odds ratio (OR) with a 95% confidence interval (95% CI). Results. In the city district of Zhezkazgan, the overall mortality rate and mortality from diseases of the circulatory system, neoplasms, and respiratory diseases were much higher than in the Karaganda region and the Republic of Kazakhstan from 2015–2020. Residents of the Talap settlement had higher rates of coronary heart disease (CHD) (OR 1.30; 95% CI: 0.70–2.39; and p < 0.05 ), arterial hypertension (AH) (OR 1.84; 95% CI: 1.11–3.03; and p < 0.05 ), decreased hemoglobin (OR 1.89; 95% CI: 1.17–3.07; and p < 0.05 ), and endocrine diseases (diabetes mellitus, obesity, and thyrotoxicosis) (OR 1.76; 95% CI: 1.12–2.79; and p < 0.05 ) at registration than residents of the Malshybai settlement. Residents of both settlements expressed dissatisfaction with the quality of drinking water and the presence of the area where launch vehicles fell. Conclusion. Indicators of pollution in the city, statistics of official mortality, and differences in morbidity indicated the negative impact of hazardous emissions from industrial facilities of the copper smelter on public health.

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Performance evaluation of scientific work on regional and individual levels can be achieved by the using scientometric methods of a quantitative analysis of bibliographic information available in such databases as Science Citation Index (SCI). Unfortunately, Kazakhstan scientific journals have not been included yet in the Thomson Reuters Corp. register of periodicals, that substantially distorts the actual national scientometric indexes. The analysis of Database “National Citation Reports” (Kazakhstan), which correlated with a contribution of Kazakhstan into the world science development, has shown the low level of research activities of Kazakhstan scientists on international arena. So, the share of international publications of Kazakhstan in the global flow is equal to 0,021 % (1044 doc.) that corresponds to the 87th place in the general list of countries of 177 names. Subject to the ranking of countries into groups by the number of the published works, Kazakhstan is referring to the group of 46 countries having 1000-10000 publications over 5 years, of which 8,6% in  medicine. In this article the use of statistics and appropriate software by the authors of original articles in such journals as recommended by the Kazakh National Centre for Scientific & Technical Expertise (NCSTE) and included in the Database еlibrary.kz was evaluated. Research was conducted according to Research Report, due to which a research design and statistical analysis methods were estimated.  In the rating of the research design, the authors of articles mostly used as follows: description of a series of cases–63,2%, description of the individual cases -27,1%, and description of specific cases–9,1%. A scope of selection in Section “Research Methods” was only calculated in 21,8% of cases, and in 63,9% of cases there was no description how the selection was carried out. Methods of analytical statistics were used in the 46,0% of cases. And there were references to the program package in use only in 17,5% of works. Thus shown that non-compliance with international standards in the preparation of scientific papers, primarily statistical requirements directly affect the quality and ratings of domestic articles.