This paper will look at the role of data in the communication strategies of the Russian administration in the field of health and the struggles for data in the Russian public sphere. Since the early 2010s, the opening of public data has been at the heart of communication conflicts in Russia. The Russian state is officially pursuing an "open data" policy that has raised journalists' hopes for transparency and objectivity. However, conflicts arose over access to and interpretation of data. In Russia as elsewhere, data are socially and politically constructed. They are enrolled in public and political controversies. Some data, which had been open in the past, are now closed. This paper will review, in a pragmatic approach, the strategies of communication and interpretation of social data in the Russian public sphere.
