Michel Guillot says:
In the former Soviet republics of Central Asia, ethnic Russians have exhibited higher adult mortality than native ethnic groups (Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, etc.) in spite of their higher socioeconomic status. The mortality disadvantage of ethnic Russians at adult ages appears to have even increased since the break-up of the Soviet Union. The most common explanation for this paradox, which we term the "Russian mortality paradox," is that deaths are better reported among ethnic Russians. In this study, we use detailed mortality data from Kyrgyzstan between 1959 and 1999 to evaluate various explanations for the Russian mortality paradox: data artifacts; migration effects; and cultural effects. We find that the most plausible explanation is the cultural hypothesis, because the personal behaviors that appear to generate a large part of the observed mortality differentials (alcohol consumption, in particular) seem to be closely tied to cultural practices. We examine the implications of this finding for understanding the health crisis in post-Soviet states.
According to this paper by Guillot, Natalia Gavrilova, and Tetyana Pudrovska, alcohol and suicide are the biggies here. I haven't looked at this in detail (and, unfortunately, the graphs aren't pretty enough for me to want to display here) but it looks interesting and potentially important--especially if, as suggested in the above abstract, most observers are misunderstanding this.
