POKROV, Russia – The rude medical treatment that Aleksei A. Navalny, a Russian opposition leader, is receiving in prison poses a lethal risk to his health, his personal doctor told reporters on Tuesday. The doctor was later arrested, along with several reporters.
Navalny, the preeminent political opponent of President Vladimir V. Putin, is 44 and survived poisoning with a military nerve agent last summer that Western governments called an assassination attempt by the Kremlin, which denied any role.
In January, he voluntarily returned to Russia after receiving treatment in Germany. Upon arrival, he was arrested at the airport for violation of probation related to a suspended sentence in 2014.
In the past few weeks, Navalny has experienced back pain and numbness in his legs, according to his social media accounts, which he publishes on his behalf with information he passes on to lawyers. Lawyers said in a recent interview that they suspect these conditions are persistent symptoms of the poisoning or the result of a spinal disc herniation.
Navalny has also been on a hunger strike for nearly a week now because of what his social media accounts describe as prison officials’ failure to provide him with sufficient medical care.
In addition, prison doctors said on Monday that Navalny was showing signs of a respiratory illness. According to state media, they transferred him to an infirmary on the grounds of the penal colony, where he is serving a sentence of more than two years for violation of parole.
Navalny’s temperature rose to 40 degrees Fahrenheit and he had what he described in a social media post as a severe cough.
An obvious possibility, the coronavirus – known to spread easily in prisons – has not been diagnosed. Authorities tested Navalny for the virus, the Izvestia newspaper reported. Navalny said in a post on social media that he suspected tuberculosis, a common contagion in Russian prisons.
Anastasia Vasilyeva, her private doctor, told reporters on Tuesday that she was “very concerned about his health, about what could happen to his health tomorrow”.
“I understand very clearly from the symptoms he has now, which can lead to a very serious condition and even death,” she said at a checkpoint on a muddy road outside the prison in Pokrov, about 60 miles east of Moscow after the guards refused his request to examine Mr. Navalny. “This is an insane violation of human rights.”
The refusal to allow access was expected. Mrs. Vasilyeva, who leads an organization of medical workers in the political opposition, Doctors ‘Alliance, appeared outside the prison with about half a dozen medical colleagues to demonstrate the authorities’ refusal to grant access to specialist care.
With their white robes swaying in the icy wind, the doctors wandered around the bleak place.
The prison, Penal Colony No. 2 in the Vladimir region, is surrounded by a frozen swamp. Doctors said they intended to hold a regular protest on the spot, in view of the barbed wire wrapped around the prison wall, until Navalny received proper treatment. Prison officials say they provide adequate care.
“We don’t plan to withdraw,” said Vasilyeva. “We will come tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, until they let us in and we can understand what is happening to Aleksei.”
But after her action on Tuesday, the police arrested Ms. Vasilyeva, several other doctors and journalists, including a CNN correspondent, Matthew Chance. Mr. Chance was later released.
After chemical weapon poisoning, Mr. Navalny was evacuated to Germany for treatment. The German government said it had discovered traces of Novichok, an exotic nervous agent that can be lethal to the touch and which is known to have been made only in Russia and previously in the Soviet Union.
The poison was also used in the 2018 assassination attempt on a double agent, Sergei Skripal, in Britain, according to the British government.
“There is nothing difficult to understand here,” said Ivan Tumanov, director of Navalny’s movement in the Vladimir region, in an interview on Tuesday about Navalny’s deteriorating health. “Putin wants Navalny to die, so he is not allowing doctors to visit”
Supporters say prison officials have also resorted to petty harassment. Near Navalny, who is now on a hunger strike, they grilled chicken, Kira Yarmysh, Navalny’s spokeswoman said on Tuesday.
Navalny’s team suggested that one of the main concerns now is tuberculosis. Although an old threat in developed countries, and treatable in its usual form with antibiotics, the disease is a persistent killer in Russian prisons.
Thin, exhausted men crowd the tuberculosis wards. And adverse conditions have spawned new strains peculiar to Russian penal colonies, alarming global health experts for years.
Seeking to spend time in the infirmary to avoid violence from other prisoners, prisoners sometimes try to get sick on purpose or prolong the duration of the illness by refusing to take full antibiotic treatment or changing saliva.
The result, say infectious disease experts, is a proliferation of antibiotic-resistant forms of tuberculosis.
Mr. Navalny’s social media accounts said on Monday that three inmates in his barracks were hospitalized for tuberculosis.