The situation in Ukraine is dominating the news at the moment, and we are able to follow the invasion live. For us, at Child-Help, the conflict has come close to our work. Even though our primary focus of work has been developing countries in Africa and Latin America, through different events and circumstances, we have been supporting a parent organization for children with spina bifida and hydrocephalus in Ukraine for 8 years now.
We started supporting this local parent group by supplying medical equipment to the country. Via a 4th pillar project in Edegem “Ukraine Project Edegem”, we came into contact with a wound care specialist, Ihor Vitenko, because wound care is a particularly important component for our target group. In 2017, two Ukrainian doctors also traveled to Belgium for training on continence care in collaboration with the University Hospital of Leuven. We supported further development in the country by Slovakian specialists – which helped us overcome the language barrier.
In 2016, Pierre Mertens travelled to Ukraine at the invitation of Ukraine Project Edegem. You can read that travel story here, which was written after the annexation of Crimea in 2014.
We are continuing the support to our friends and Ukraine. So far, we have purchased 3 second-hand ambulances that are already in Ukraine along with Ihor, helping children with spina bifida and hydrocephalus on the ground. Based on Ihor’s insights, we know what is needed in Ukraine now, for our target group, and he has been stressing the importance of vacuum pumps for wound care. The parent group Lights of Spirit and Ihor have been trying to reach all its members in the country and provide care. Many parents of children with disabilities flee to safe regions of the country where they stay with relatives but do not have access to their own local network or to medical materials.
Our main goal now is to obtain and deliver the list of needed medical materials to them in the shortest period of time.
You can support us and the affected families in Ukraine by making a donation:
via https://childhelp.koalect.com/…
direct to BE56 7380 1971 7088 with reference ‘Support Ukraine’
Do you want to organize action and donate the proceeds to Child-Help for Ukraine?
Contact us at [email protected] or +32486912885 and we’ll talk about this.
For example, Groen Sint-Niklaas organized a quiz on 16 April. All proceeds go entirely to Child-Help for Ukraine.
