Mikhail Gorbachev major campaign to limit alcohol consumption, which Gorbachev—who believed it would improve health and work efficiency—oversaw. His wife keenly supported the measure. As a result, crime rates fell and life expectancy grew slightly between 1986 and 1987. The reform had significant costs to the Soviet economy, resulting in losses of up to $100 billion between 1985 and 1990. Gorbachev later considered the campaign to have been an error. In April 1986 the Chernobyl disaster occurred; in the immediate aftermath, officials fed Gorbachev incorrect information to downplay the incident. As the scale of the disaster became apparent, 336,000 people were evacuated
Mikhail Gorbachev In Stavropol, he formed a discussion club for youths, and helped mobilise local young people to take part in Khrushchev's agricultural and development campaigns. He went out of his way to appoint women as city and district leaders. With an ability to outmanoeuvre rivals, some colleagues resented his success. In 1961, Gorbachev played host to the Italian delegation for the World Youth Festival in Moscow. In January 1963, Gorbachev was promoted to personnel chief for the regional party's agricultural committee. In August 1968 the Soviet Union led an invasion of Czechoslovakia to put an end to the Prague Spring, a