The head of the World Health Organisation, Gro Harlem Brundtland, has urged Russia to combat alcohol and tobacco abuse and do more to improve health.

She told a news conference in Moscow that firm action would go a long way to stem the decline in life expectancy.

Russian men now live an average of sixty years, and women seventy-two.

The World Health chief also called for stronger measures to tackle Aids and tuberculosis, the latter chronic in Russia's overcrowded prisons.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service