Anatoly Shcharansky “looks very bad, and is very skinny,” according to his brother Leonid, who, with his mother Ida Milgrom, was permitted a two-hour conversation with him Monday at the Chistipol Prison, 500 miles from Moscow. The talk had to be conducted through a glass partition under the eyes of two guards. Leonid was reached by phone by Mrs. Lynn Singer, president of the Long Island Committee for Soviet Jewry.
Shcharansky said his brother’s condition is “awful, intolerable. We’re afraid some tragedy may take place.” Despite substantial foreign protests, Shcharansky told Mrs. Singer, Anatoly has received no medical care.
According to the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, and London activist Michael Sherbourne, Mrs. Milgrom reported separately that “although we knew it was Tolyo (Anatoly), it was impossible to recognize him. He was just skin and bones. He had a sharp nose like a knife and staring eyes. He has severe headaches if he reads more than ten minutes.”
According to Mrs. Milgrom, she told her son that she had written to the Ministers of Health and Interior about his severe head pains and failing eye-sight, and was informed that he was examined and his illness treated. Anatoly responded that the only examination he had was the routine check all Chistipol Prison inmates had received by a visiting doctor, and all had been declared healthy. His eyes were never examined.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
