Despite sweeping sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia’s economy hasn’t broken down and even appears resilient, as it’s now being driven by wartime state spending on military activities and subsidies.
“Consumption is booming due to a combination of massive budget spending and labor force shortages leading to strong wage pressures,”
Y’all. Morphine, heroin, opium, and nearly all opiates are from pretty flowers. Cocaine is from leafy greens. Quinine (malaria medicine) is from a tree. Penicillin is from moldy bread. Digoxin (a.k.a. digitalis a.k.a. Lanoxin) is from pretty flowers. Paclitaxel (a.k.a. chemotherapeutic Taxol) is from a tree.
You are being idealist when you imagine that all medicine is divorced from history and exists only in Euro-techno laboratories from non-earthly components.
Seconded and there are many more.
Many synthetic pharmaceuticals are based on natural molecules extracted from plants and fungi. Some are further modified to change their properties, but we often learn what works from studying natural products.
Nature is just better at this shit than we are. We steal their ideas, modify them slightly, and patent them.
Those historically low average lifespans are often due to high infant mortality, not adults dying at a young age.