Vladimir Putin's opening remarks:

Good afternoon, colleagues.

Today's meeting of the Presidium of the Council on National Priority Projects will focus on plans to implement the Concept of the Demographic Policy Through 2015 and also specify related goals in education, healthcare and the housing policy.

You know that I mentioned some achievements in the country's demographic development in the report on government performance at the State Duma. However, I will repeat some facts today, which seems to be expedient.

The annual birth rate has exceeded 1.5 million since 2007. More precisely, it was 1.6 million in 2007, 1.7 million in 2008 and 1.76 million in 2009. This is a positive, if moderate dynamic.

In the past four years, the mortality rate has been steadily on the decline and life expectancy has reached 69 years.

Last year, the total population did not decrease but even grew a little.

In other words, we have achieved the goals of the demographic programme's first stage. We can now proceed to the second stage. What are its priorities?

In the next few years, we must not only stabilise Russia's population, but also create conditions for gradual growth. Life expectancy should grow to 71 years. We will use all the tools at our disposal to achieve these goals. We will promote the values of motherhood and childhood, and work to further lower the death rate.

I'd like to remind you that a substantial increase in child allowance and the introduction of the maternity capital have increased family income. Spending for these purposes will remain intact despite problems with the budget and the budget deficit.

At the same time, we should be clear that couples often opt against having a baby for financial reasons, because it is difficult to have a baby and to make a career, and also because they are not sure they can resolve their housing problems or that their children will attend a good kindergarten and subsequently a good school.

To dispel these fears and create additional encouragement for families, we should accelerate the modernisation of preschool education. We must also think of ways to cut queues for preschool openings and more actively introduce preschool development, learning and sports programmes.

The new "Housing" programme should focus on ways to make housing for new families more affordable. The idea is to subsidise interest rates and down payments for mortgage loans and to build more comfortable housing for families with children, mostly single family and low-rise houses.

Also, we should draft special programmes for vocational and advanced training for the women who plan to resume their careers after giving birth to a child. Young mothers could attend such courses during their maternity leave.

In short, our key objective is to provide conditions whereby having children would open up better prospects and opportunities for a family, rather than force new parents to face complex problems they do not know how to deal with.

Colleagues,

We have other important tasks as well, such as improvement of the nation's health and reducing the premature death rate.

We should certainly carry on the postnatal mother and child care programmes that are part of the Healthcare national priority project. This is most closely linked to the first focus of today's meeting. We need to continue dealing with cardiovascular and infectious diseases and with cancer; we must improve the care of traffic accident victims and expand the availability of advanced medical technology nationwide.

Cash incentives for local clinic personnel will continue in 2010-2012 as part of the Healthcare project; the programme will encompass about 315,000 medical personnel.

Anti-infection programmes involving broader regular checkups and vaccination will be continued, annually covering 22 million people each. Government programmes to support treatment of cardiovascular disorders, cancer and tuberculosis will be continued, too.

We will be improving medical care for victims of traffic accidents. As you know, we have already achieved positive results here, and we will certainly continue on this track.

There is a plan to commission 11 federal centres with advanced medical technology. Over 1.5 million women and their babies can apply for assistance annually under the Birth Certificate programme. Starting in 2011, the national project will include a teenage medical check-up programme.

In this connection, I would like to inform you that I signed a resolution yesterday to allocate 908 million roubles to build 17 medical centres in Russian regions under direct government supervision. These will include a perinatal centre in Dagestan, a regional hospital in Saransk and a children's hospital in Voronezh.

We must also focus on programmes where the results are unimpressive at this point. There is a new initiative this year to invest around 460 billion roubles of additional medical insurance premiums in national healthcare modernisation.

The funds will be allocated for specific projects to improve medical services. First of all I would like to draw your attention to the absolutely unacceptable state of local healthcare in rural areas and small towns.

Another important task is to introduce innovative technologies and methods in providing emergency medical aid and treatment for grave diseases. It is also important to reduce industrial injuries and work-related diseases.

We all certainly realize that successful treatment of a case largely depends on the physician's professional qualification. Therefore, introducing new technology requires retraining personnel. A relevant programme is needed.

The Ministries of Healthcare and Finance, and the Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund now need to rework the legal framework for public healthcare and rewrite the law on compulsory health insurance. The resulting bills should be promptly brought before the State Duma; we must also ask lawmakers to adopt them in the first reading as soon as in June.

The government should simultaneously begin drafting the relevant regulatory acts, primarily pertaining to the financing of regional healthcare modernisation programmes, and to the specific plans for their implementation based on agreements between the Healthcare Ministry and the Federal Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund, on the one hand, and regional governments, on the other.

Next, I am asking you to develop a transparent system for keeping personal accounts, which would be clear to older people. In any case, this idea that I mentioned in my address to parliament should be documented. It still needs a lot of review and negotiating with the regions, and with lawmakers.

Third. The regions should begin an inventory of their medical centres' equipment and other property, including an evaluation of the state of the buildings and the sufficiency of the required equipment. The results will form the basis for developing regional healthcare modernisation programmes.

Let me repeat that the purpose of regional programmes is not to revamp, upgrade or replace whatever property there is. We do not need to invest in an ineffective system, and we cannot afford it. On the contrary, we are trying to build the best healthcare system we can, one that would meet a patient's real needs.

Measurements of effectiveness and of the quality of health services should be included as a key section in each regional modernisation programme, such as increase in birth rates and life expectancy, and decrease in the death rate.

The Healthcare Ministry will approve the regional programmes in autumn, so that they can start on January 1, 2011.

I would also ask the regions to hold competitive bidding and place orders for the implementation of the programmes promptly. In fact this had better be done before January 1. This way we would be able to report at least some results of our work next year, such as modernised and well-equipped medical centres, with retrained medical personnel.

Let me emphasise that the heads of the regional governments will be made personally responsible for the implementation of these programmes, rather than their deputies for health or social issues.

In conclusion, I would like to mention one more important aspect of our demographic policy. Despite the economic downturn, which put the country's economy in a much more vulnerable position than we would have liked, as many as 280,000 people moved to Russia for permanent residence last year, while only 30,000 left. What does this mean? This means that Russia is still an attractive destination for immigrants, primarily from the CIS countries.

This is certainly Russia's major competitive advantage, which we should use intensively but reasonably in the future for the benefit of Russians as well as new immigrants who choose this country to live in. The door is open for those who wish to spend the rest of their lives in Russia, to know and respect Russia's history and traditions, to abide by local laws and work hard.