Once upon a time in Russia, as in many countries, it was unseemly for women to drink and certainly to drink to excess. That began to change in the 1960s and, while it may not be possible to put the genie back in the bottle, some health professionals are working to educate Russian women and their doctors about the problems caused by drinking during pregnancy.

One of them is Tatiana Balachova, and I had a chance to interview her last week. Born and educated in Russia, Balachova is now an assistant professor at the University of Oklahoma, and... more

Maybe it's because I've watched the "Wizard of Oz" too many times, but I can't write the word "tigers" without also whispering under my breath "lions and bears, oh my". As luck would have it, this is B week in my little guy's class and they will be having a day about bears. And no nation is more closely identified with bears than the country of his birth, Russia.

A Russian circus wouldn't be a Russian circus without a bear act. You'll find bears on some of the regional emblems around the country, and... more

I got a lovely surprise in the mail over the weekend. No, not the six new cookbooks I've ordered (the "Jessica's Biscuit" catalog was too compelling). It was my first copy of Russian Life, a bi-monthly gem of a magazine about all things Russian.

Maybe you know all about Russian Life; after all it's only been around for 50 years. But maybe you remember what it used to be--a bit too much one-sided cheering--and hadn’t thought to pick up a copy lately. If that's your only memory, or if you've never seen the magazine, you... more

This past weekend was the best of times--and the worst of times. Ordinarily, I'd say the less said about the latter the better. But to understand the highlights, you have to have seen the lowlights.

Look folks, there is no way around it. A child adopted at an older age is different. They have seen things and have had to do things that most middle-class American kids have not. And when you are different, your differences can be a focal point for taunts. And when your English is still not up to par with the other kids your age, you can't parry those taunts with words. So... more

President Vladimir Putin captured much of the news this week by announcing that he would seek a seat in the December legislative elections and hinting that he might serve as prime minister under the present who succeeds him next March. The British magazine The Economist had a fairly pithy analysis of Putin's strategy, or perhaps stratagem.

The natural gas dispute between Russia and Ukraine went from... more

Tuberculosis is a serious disease and it has been around for a long time. But there are well-established ways to detect it and a range of drugs to treat it.

TB can be either latent, which isn't contagious, or active. A person must be in close contact with an infected person to become infected, which could potentially describe the conditions in a Russian orphanage. According to the Mayo Clinic, a woman with active TB can sometimes pass the disease to her fetus, but that is rare. In many cases, the body's own immune system defeats TB; that defeat can result in a positive TB test, but not... more

So imagine you're a journalist who has just reported that a study concluded that children who were adopted between 1986 and 2001 had a high rate of infection from tuberculosis. What would your next step be? If you answered ask whether the infection rate is still that high, you get a gold star. Unfortunately, the Canadian Press reporter behind the story in part one didn't.

Luckily, there is some good recent data to answer that question.

In March of this year, the World Health Organization released a report, "Global... more

The newsletter from the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute arrived in my e-mail late last week and it contained a scary headline: "TUBERCULOSIS INFECTIONS IN INTERNATIONAL ADOPTEES REPORTED RISING". According to the accompanying blurb, children from Russia had the second highest rate of infection. Wow. I immediately bookmarked it for a post this week.

And then, as I frequently tell my kids, there's the truth.

Let me say, before I get too far into this post, that I do not in any way mean to downplay the seriousness of tuberculosis.... more

Well, I'm not sure what to call what happened in Russia yesterday.

In a nutshell, President Vladimir Putin announced he was running for the December parliamentary elections and hinted that he could be prime minister after his term as president expires next year. The announcement was made at a convention of the pro-Putin United Russia party and, according to this report in The New York Times, it was a masterpiece of political... more

Sometimes, the ins and outs of adopting from Russia just make my head hurt. Like today.

For the last two weeks, I have been trying to chase down a rumor that a U.S. government agency, not late post-placement reports, was holding up the re-accreditation process. I finally got confirmation today, after many rounds of phone calls and e-mails, that it was, but it is no longer.

Here's what happened. As part of the re-accreditation process, an obscure American bureaucracy that goes... more