At least two elderly women were found frozen to death in unheated homes in St. Petersburg and central Russia’s Sverdlovsk region, media reported Tuesday.
In the Sverdlovsk region town of Sukhoy Log, located some 1,900 kilometers east of Moscow, animal rights activists discovered the body of a resident who lived in a wooden shack.
“The house had no water or heating, the gas was cut off six months ago,” a volunteer identified by her first name Viktoria told the news website Ura.ru.
A video shared by the outlet showed several emaciated dogs and cats indoors being fed by the volunteers.
“The inside was a mess, it was cold [and] there was feces everywhere,” Viktoria said.
Regional police spokesman Valery Gorelykh told Ura.ru that its local unit was probing the circumstances surrounding the woman’s death.
Meanwhile, in St. Petersburg, a 70-year-old resident died from frostbite inside an unheated shipping container where she had lived with her adult daughter, according to local media.
The 78.ru news outlet reported in early December that two other elderly women had frozen to death in St. Petersburg.
The series of deaths came as freezing weather continued to grip much of Russia, with several towns and villages experiencing a succession of power outages.
