More than three years after the war began, the situation in Ukraine is extremely difficult. There is suffering, fear, death, a conflict that does not stop, and there are the trampled lives of people.
In the city and region of Kharkiv, AMU and Caritas-Spes Ukraine continue to provide healthcare to all those who would otherwise have no access to treatment: thousands of internally displaced persons have settled in this area and live in precarious conditions, without knowing who to turn to in case of need.
The mobile team of doctors and nurses – which AMU supports with the Emergency Ukraine action – makes continuous home visits, every day of the week, often finding themselves in front of elderly and vulnerable people, who have fled from cities where living had become unbearable, and are now disoriented, alone, scared. Waiting to be able to return to normality.
When the medical team arrived at the home of Alla, an 85-year-old woman, they discovered that three people live in the apartment: with her are two other women, her sister born in 1939, and her daughter born in 1959. All three were displaced from the city of Toretsk in eastern Ukraine.
They had to abandon their home
The three women left their homes with only the clothes they were wearing.
They couldn’t take anything else with them, not even the most essential goods. They lost everything : their home, of course, but also all those objects that symbolize memories, warmth, comfort.
Once they arrived in Kharkiv, they found themselves completely alone, at the mercy of a present without any lifelines. By pooling their pensions – which the state had reduced because of the war – they managed to rent the apartment where they now live.
But they have health problems.
The Consequences of the War in Ukraine on Women’s Health
The doctor who examined them did not find them in good condition.
Alla suffers from dementia and a mental disorder related to the loss of her home and the devastation of her daily life. Her sister Svitlana, on the other hand, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder that has contributed to the development of a severe form of psoriasis.
Medicines and personal hygiene items were distributed to them. And psychological support also intervened, indispensable in dealing with the traumas of war.
For these women, the assistance they received was not just “simple” material help: what they needed above all was not to feel abandoned in their pain. Even in the darkest moments, hope can be reborn .
