This article analyzes the results of a survey of Belarusian and Russian university students. There were 939 participants, of which 757 were females, 180 were Males, 715 were from Russia, and 224 were from Belarus. The average age of the participants was 21.8 years old. The questions were about their fear level due to COVID-19, the impact of the pandemic on their social lives, and how much COVID-19 influenced substance use. The researchers hypothesized that fear and substance use levels have a direct correlation to the country’s response to the pandemic. The results of this survey showed that students from Russia were more likely to say that they are depressed. Overall, Russian students were more prone to reporting negative psycho-emotional conditions. This could be a direct result of Russia’s strict quarantine conditions, and the media coverage of the pandemic. On the other hand, Belarus dealt with the pandemic adopting a “life as usual” approach. Only people that were traveling back to Belarus from a country that had an epidemic had to quarantine. The differences in how they handled the pandemic could be the cause of the disparity of mental health in these two countries. We can see, from the results of the survey, that increased substance use has a direct correlation to strict quarantining, as students from Russia and Belarus who endured quarantine had an increased use of substances. Students from both Russia and Belarus are experiencing negative emotional effects from the pandemic, however, overall, Russian students seem to be more affected than Belarus students.
