“Improved six-barreled flea-thrower with a refuting double-barreled trailer.”
Ballistic cannisters labeled “plague,” “typhus,” “cholera.”
(American Secretary of State Dean Acheson and UN Secretary-General Trygve Lie are doing the refuting.)
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1952)
Doctor: “Our sanatorium is not counterindicated for you, you have strong nerves, they can handle it.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1955)
(Public health and disease themes largely disappear from Krokodil after the 1930s, when the Soviet health system finally developed sufficient capacity to serve a burgeoning urban middle class. Yet a Crimean sanatorium like the one depicted here was still a precious resource in high demand, and gentle satire of middle-class aspirations remained a Krokodil specialty.)
At the factory clinic.
“I can’t get treatment from the doctor; he’ll tell me, “Take a deep breath,” and if I exhale, he’ll catch it all.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1939)
“It’s not details I need, but the general picture. Try to calculate the average temperature for the whole ward!”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1937)
The infectious disease of the year, the flu, is transmitted most of all via kissing when greeting each other.
(Ogonek no. 6, Moscow, 1927)
(Though I took the image from another source, I owe this to the Soviet Visuals page on Facebook.)
“You should be ashamed to be afraid of the dark, Pete!”
“But papa’s a grownup and he says he won’t go to the countryside! There’s such darkness there!”
(Chudak, Moscow, 1929)
“Poland is holding tightly to a world championship in one thing, colleague: in tuberculosis.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1938)
“You’re a respectable fellow, but you study trifles like microbes. In your place I would prefer something bigger.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1946)
“Little girl! Please don’t touch the doggie! You might still infect her with something!”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1926)
Typhus: “Well, brother famine, what are you up to?”
Famine: “Here I am, wandering around the district.”
Typhus: “Not taking a look at the neighboring district?”
Famine: “No, I’m not allowed over there. They have the rotating crop field system there.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1924)
Inspector: “Say, are there any bedbugs found here?”
Resident: “Mercy! Can bedbugs stand these conditions? It’s a weak insect, where would it go?”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1927)
Malarial mosquito (gazing in horror at People’s Commissar of Health Nikolai Semashko): “Here is a harmful insect! One of its stings’ll cost you.”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1925)
(A gang has been uncovered that is faking certificates of illness for obtaining health insurance benefits.)
“What? You have tuberculosis? But do you know how much tuberculosis costs now? Better you should have a stomach ulcer. For yours–get well soon!”
(Krokodil, Moscow, 1925)
Sic Transit Pestilentia 