After her husband’s death, 70-year-old Tatiana Turkina was left alone with two adult children with disabilities. Oleg has muscular dystrophy, he cannot walk. His sister Nastya has muscular dystrophy and oligophrenia, she needs constant care. They live in an apartment on the second floor of a multi-storey building that is not suitable for people with disabilities, and Tatiana, due to her age, cannot carry them on her own.
“There used to be acquaintances, friends. But after my husband’s death, everyone gradually turned away from us. No one even came to the funeral,” Tatiana tells ASTRA.
Her husband, who seemed to be a strong and healthy man until the last moment, died of cancer in a month and a half four years ago.
“He was always healthy, didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, didn’t offend anyone. I helped the children. And now we’re all alone. The state only says to hold on. But there is no help,” says Tatiana.
Her son Oleg grew up as healthy child, but in adolescence it became difficult for him to move around. Gradually, he stopped walking and lost ability to use his hands.
“He’s barely typing on the keyboard,” says his mother.
The youngest daughter, Nastya, was born with a developmental delay. Today Nastya crawls around the apartment, refusing to use a wheelchair.
“She doesn’t agree to it, she doesn’t accept it,” the mother sighs.
The family cannot leave the apartment on their own. Social protection offered to help with garbage collection or grocery shopping, but caring for seriously ill adults “is not their responsibility.” One day, one of the public organizations helped with money — allocated 4,500 rubles. And that’s it, says the woman.
“We asked for help from local authorities, bloggers, and the prosecutor’s office. The commission came and looked at our living conditions. They said, ‘We’re not supposed to do anything,’” Tatiana recalls. In desperation, she turned for help abroad: she wrote to international public organizations. There was no response.
“Every day is the same. I pick up Nastya, wash her, feed her. Then I lift Oleg up and help him. Then I cook breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Cleaning, laundry, everything is on me. Nastya paints, watches movies. Oleg is sitting at the computer. There is no communication with anyone. We have no relatives. No one visits us,” Tatiana describes her life.
“If something happens to me, Oleg and Nastya will be left alone,” she adds.
Local authorities offer the family to move to a state-supported living center, but they refuse. According to them, this is equivalent to a sentence for them. The Turkins’ family dreams of getting out of a country where, according to them, no one cares about their fate.
“Here we were abandoned to the mercy of fate, we were left in danger by the fault of the Russian authorities. Our family appeals to all concerned people in free countries to help us leave Russia and apply for asylum abroad. Our situation is desperate!” says Oleg.
In Russia, an annual budget of 57 billion rubles is allocated for the implementation of the Affordable Environment program. Among other things, it involves relocation of people with disabilities who use wheelchairs to suitable homes.
In 2018, construction of such a house began in the Orenburg region, but the auction results were cancelled and it was never completed. In the fall of 2024 local authorities reported that they were improving the living conditions for ten wheelchair users by repairing their apartments and widening the doorways. At the same time, there is a total of 200 thousand people with disabilities, every tenth resident of the region. Twenty thousand of them are disabled people of the first group. Eight hundred and ninety of them are moving only using a wheelchair.
