Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a multifactorial disease of the central nervous system. The apolipoprotein E (APOE) and interleukin 1 beta (IL1B) genes are considered to be candidate genes of MS. The aim of the study was to examine the hypothesis of the importance of APOE and IL1B gene polymorphisms in MS development in ethnic Tatars. DNA samples isolated by phenol-chloroform extraction from peripheral blood of 383 ethnic Tatars (120 MS patients and 263 healthy donors) were studied. 112C/R and 158R/C APOE gene polymorphisms as well as -511T/C IL1B gene polymorphism were analyzed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) followed by PCR product digestion by endonuclease. Odds ratio (OR) values were used for evaluation of the relative risk of alleles and(or) genotype combinations. It has been shown that APOE*2/*3 genotype is associated with low risk of the disease development (OR = 0.20) in women. A combined effect of APOE and IL1B allelic variants has been discovered indicating the increased risk of the disease development in the carriers of APOE*4 and IL1B*T/*T alleles (OR = 4.76).