For years, Russian state media made an art form out of keeping Alexey Navalny’s name off the air. By resorting to innuendo, nicknames or just ignoring him entirely, pro-Kremlin voices had hit on a simple and effective way to muffle support for the opposition leader.

But now, with Navalny in failing health as he serves a two-and-a-half-year prison sentence for parole violations related to a 2014 fraud charge, pro-government voices have surged across traditional and social media channels.

“The government’s strategy has changed,” said Abbas Gallyamov, a former Kremlin speechwriter turned political analyst in Moscow. “In the past, they just ignored him, but now they’ve gone to war with him.”

On April 1, the pro-Kremlin channels RT and NTV sent camera crews to Penal Colony Number 2, where Navalny is held, about 100 miles east of Moscow. Maria Butina, a Russian agent who was jailed and later deported from the United States in 2019, was the first person permitted to visit the jailed opposition leader. The report centered around allegations made by Navalny of forced sleep deprivation and other abuses at the penal colony posted on his social media accounts. His wife, Yulia Navalnaya, wrote on March 25 on Instagram that “these bastards” were even denying him painkillers for the severe back pain he’s had since his trial. The pain had escalated and he was losing sensation in his legs. On March 31, Navalny went on a hunger strike in protest of being denied basic medical care.