With world oil prices high on supply concerns from Nigeria and Iran, Russia is bringing in nearly US$500 million (407 million euros) in revenues from oil and gas exports every 24 hours, analysts say. Petrodollars are dripping through into ordinary Russian's pockets, Sokolin said, with average incomes rising 8.3 percent in real terms in 2005, real wages up 9.7 percent and the average monthly pensions increasing by 9.3 percent over the year.

But as Russia's financial health is improving, the physical health of its citizens continues to be on the decline.

Russia's population dropped by 0.5 percent, or 680,000 people, to 142.8 million last year, Sokolin said. And the average life span of the Russian male is now just 58, the level to which it dropped in the social turmoil that followed the default just over seven years ago. "Nothing has changed with regard to life expectancy," he said.

Read the rest of this Pravda.Ru story at Johnson's Russia List.