[The organization of industrial production of penicillin in the USSR].

The article on the basis of analysis of declassified materials of the State Archive of the Russian Federation covers the history of the organization of industrial production of penicillin in the USSR in second half of the 1940s. The analysis of the documents demonstrated that existed huge gap between health needs of the antibiotic and actual quantity of its production by the end of 1945. This raised the question of organizing its large-scale production. The Soviet Government tried to solve the problem in the least expensive way i.e. through using available industrial areas for the development of penicillin production, refusing to buy ready-made penicillin plants abroad, maximal application of resources of international organizations. The problem of mastering advanced technologies of antibiotic production, as well as development of national equipment for penicillin plants was mainly solved through efforts of intelligence service activities. Due to organizational, technological, foreign policy causes, the development of new penicillin plants was delayed for a long time. The amounts of penicillin production by existing enterprises did not cover the needs of health care in the antibiotic.