Calculation of the Public Health Index in the Regions of the Russian Federation

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the need to improve methods of public health assessment and approaches to the development of a system for its monitoring in the Russian Federation. Public health represents a sociomedical resource of the society, deterioration of which has a negative effect on the potential of the society to resist emerging threats. Within a series of previous studies, the authors have developed a methodological approach to calculating the public health index, the monitoring of which will facilitate managerial decisions aimed at strengthening of the potential of public health. 
Objective: To test a methodological approach to calculating the public health index in the regions of the Russian Federation. 
Materials and methods: To estimate the public health index, we applied an original methodology specially developed with account for strategic goals outlined by the Russian President and provisions of the WHO Handbook for calculation and use of the Urban Health Index. It includes correlation assessment and standardization of parameters. The components of the public health index were selected in view of the requirements established by the presidential decree on preserving the population of the country, developing the human potential, and strengthening national defense capabilities. 
Results: We calculated Russian regional values of the public health index for the year 2019. The year selection was determined by the absence of significant biological challenges, currently posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the aftermath of the pension reform. The estimated mean of the public health index in the Russian Federation in 2019 was 0.238, with extremes established in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug (0.458) and the Kurgan Region (0.036). 
Conclusions: Public health monitoring involves tracking of achieved values of the public health index and its individual constituents as they allow judgment on the potential of the society to counteract external threats. Further research should be aimed at analyzing changes in the public health index in the regions of Russia during and after large-scale biological and social challenges. It seems expedient to consider the issue of creating a national information portal devoted to public health problems in the country.