Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, currently serving a 30-day jail sentence for violating Russia’s strict laws on political protests, was hospitalized Sunday morning with symptoms that resembled an acute allergic reaction.
His doctor said it was possible Navalny was poisoned and warned that discharging him from the hospital on Monday could endanger his life.
Navalny was arrested last week when he left his house in Moscow to go jogging. “People are right when they say that sport is not always good for your health,” he remarked with characteristic sarcasm.
Navalny was charged with organizing an immense protest in Moscow the previous Saturday to protest the exclusion of opposition candidates from September’s parliamentary elections. He threatened another protest would be held the following weekend, and it did indeed come to pass, even though he himself was in jail.
Moscow police cracked down on the demonstration and arrested almost 1,400 of its participants, breaking some limbs and dealing out a few concussions in the process. Some of the people thrown in jail alongside Navalny were the very same candidates blocked from appearing on the September ballot. The United States, European Union, and international human rights organizations denounced the violence as a “disproportionate” and “indiscriminate” use of police force.
Navalny has run for office in the past, but he is not one of the candidates for the September election. He was sentenced to 30 days in jail because authorities did not give him a license for the demonstration he called for. He had only been in jail for a few days when he was rushed to the hospital for what the staff described as an acute allergic reaction.
Navalny’s doctor Anastasia Vasilieva said she was initially denied access to her patient when she visited the hospital on Sunday and was later allowed to examine him through a cracked door. She noted symptoms including facial swelling, itching, and a rash.
According to Dr. Vasilieva, Navalny’s condition appeared to be “the result of harmful effects of undefined chemical substances.”
“We cannot rule out that toxic damage to the skin and mucous membranes by an unknown chemical substance was inflicted with the help of a ‘third party,’” she wrote in a Facebook post.
“The patient himself and his relatives are not told the diagnosis, they find it out from Interfax. Nobody knows the reason for what happened and his own doctors are kicked out. They’re lying to us,” Vasilieva charged.
According to his lawyer, Navalny has never suffered a severe allergic reaction to anything in the past, although he was partially blinded by a chemical burn in 2017 when pro-Kremlin activists attacked him. Vasilieva, an ophthalmologist, became his doctor after treating him for that injury.
Navanly was returned to jail on Monday, a move opposed by Vasilieva, who said he should remain under “close medical supervision.”
“It was a toxic reaction to a chemical. It was definitely some chemical agent. It’s absurd to call it an allergy,” she declared on Monday.
“He has not fully recovered. He should have been left under medical supervision,” Vasilieva told reporters. “Who is going to watch over him at the detention facility? They are not qualified to provide him with professional help.”
A group of about two dozen people gathered outside the hospital on Sunday to protest the way Navalny’s case has been handled. The group was confronted by a squad of police in tactical gear, who chased down and arrested several of them, plus a reporter who was covering the scene.
Russian President Vladimir Putin did not have any immediate comment on the Saturday protest or Navalny’s condition, as he away in St. Petersburg attending a naval parade.
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