Meet Raisa and Victor from Donetsk, Ukraine

• Ukraine Crisis

“An old proverb says: ‘If we are alive, we will not die.’ This is how we live, with the only hope that peace will come soon.”

Raisa and Victor live in a village in Donetsk, Ukraine, a region hard-hit by the war. There have been more than 2,000 civilian casualties in the last two years alone.

Because of the war, Raisa and Victor are alone, coping with the daily difficulties caused by Victor’s illness.

“My husband has been disabled for 20 years. He had a serious accident while working in a factory. When the weather is bad, he suffers a lot: he can’t move his arms, he has difficulty even eating or moving and I have to feed him, otherwise he won’t eat. This is my life: taking care of him,” says Raisa.

The Ukrainian health system has been impacted by the war. There is a shortage of services, and those still available are increasingly weak.

“We are left on our own: our only daughter fled with her family to the Kharkiv region and has not returned. We haven’t seen her for almost two years. We need someone to help us with all these difficulties.”

With our activities in Ukraine, we are helping to guarantee that families like Raisa and Victor have access to the healthcare they need, free of charge.