Crisis in Ukraine

As the war in Ukraine continues, our teams are responding to a humanitarian crisis. More than 14.6 million people are in need of assistance.

We are providing medical care to people who have been caught up in, or have been forced to flee, the fighting. Our teams are donating emergency supplies to hospitals and providing vital training to their staff.

There is full-scale warfare in many areas, making movements difficult, dangerous or simply impossible. We are responding in various parts of the country, based on where our assistance is needed and will have a significant impact.

Crisis in Ukraine

Conf Medical lict and war
Russian forces launched attacks on multiple cities in late February 2022, damaging key infrastructure and civilian areas. An estimated 14.6 million Ukrainians are in need of assistance.

Medical Refugees and displaced persons
As of November 2024, 6.8 million people have fled Ukraine, and more than four million are displaced within the country.

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The current situation

Following continuous low-level conflict in eastern Ukraine, in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts (provinces) since 2014, in late February 2022, Russian forces attacked multiple cities across all of Ukraine, leading to full-scale war.

The intense fighting and shelling have led to millions of people leaving Ukraine and becoming refugees. Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) teams had been working in eastern Ukraine and have suspended our usual medical activities, including our HIV and tuberculosis programmes, in order to address the current crisis.

The conflict continues to put a huge amount of pressure on health facilities that have limited staff and supplies; many hospitals are facing shortages. It is difficult to find medical and other crucial supplies in the country, as these are in high demand to meet the needs of so many patients.

How MSF is responding

Our teams continue to respond to the war in Ukraine. We currently have approximately 20 international and 350 Ukrainian staff working in response to the war across the country. They work as medical staff (surgeons, doctors, nurses); psychologists; logisticians and administrators. Here is how we are responding:

Medical evacuations

Our teams evacuate patients from hospitals close to the frontlines, including trauma patients, and refer them to hospitals in safer areas through a fleet of 17 ambulances operating across eastern Ukraine. Some of the ambulances are equipped for intensive care support. Run by a team of paramedics, doctors, and drivers, the ambulances have referred over 18,500 patients since 2023.

Emergency services

In Kherson city, an MSF medical team supports surgical and trauma activities. Medical teams run triage and operating theatre activities and perform surgeries. Our staff also provide treatment during mass casualty events and perform surgeries, in the emergency room at Pokrovsk hospital. A medical team also supports Kostiantynivka hospital in Donetsk and the Izium hospital in Kharkiv based on need.

Support to hospitals

We send donations of medical supplies and hygiene kits to medical facilities, and provide training support for emergency responses, managing a high influx of war wounded, decontamination, trauma, gender-based violence and mental health. Donations from MSF have also been used to restore hospitals damaged by shelling in Donetsk, Kherson, and Dnipropetrovsk regions.

Through early rehabilitation, MSF aims to improve patients' quality of life, reduce pain, and prevent the long-term complications frequently associated with severe injuries. This multi-disciplinary approach helps to manage pain, reduce infection risk, prevent muscle atrophy, and stabilise patients' emotional states. Ultimately, this approach supports patients in regaining independence, enabling those with severe injuries to care for themselves. However, implementing such a team-based approach in Ukrainian hospitals remains challenging. © Anhelina Shchors/MSF

Mobile clinics

MSF mobile clinics provide basic healthcare services, psychological counselling and social services, sexual and reproductive health services, mental healthcare and health promotion. Through these mobile clinics, we also provide medicines for people with chronic illnesses such as hypertension, asthma, diabetes, heart disease and epilepsy. Severely unwell patients are referred to hospitals. Through our mobile clinics in the Kherson and Mykolaiv regions, we are now screening for tuberculosis.

Mental health

Our teams provide mental health support through mobile clinics in areas where it’s hard for patients to access healthcare, particularly in rural areas and shelters for people displaced by the war. In 2023, a dedicated centre for people experiencing war-related post-traumatic stress disorder was opened in Vinnytsia. There, we offer psychological sessions for patients and people in their support network. Our specialists provide them with techniques to help reduce and prevent worsening of symptoms, increase coping skills, improve interpersonal functionality, and decrease the consequences of traumatic stress.

Physiotherapy

MSF teams are supporting seriously injured post-surgery patients with specialised physiotherapy and post-operative care in Cherkasy region in order to aid in their longer term recovery.

Responding in neighbouring countries

Poland

MSF is actively working to support the Ministry of Health to ensure that patients can access treatment for drug-resistant tuberculosis, including patients previously supported by MSF in Ukraine.

Russia

MSF has been present in Russia for more than 30 years. Currently, MSF’s teams in Russia work with regional health authorities to support crucial, life-saving treatment for patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB). MSF together with its partner organisations in Moscow and St Petersburg provides assistance to people living with HIV and hepatitis C, including those who crossed from Ukraine into Russia.
Since the start of the international armed conflict, MSF has been supporting people displaced to the southern regions of Russia and found themselves in Voronezh, Belgorod and Rostov regions. In close collaboration and partnership with local NGOs, MSF organized teams of local social workers, medical consultants and psychologists, to ensure that people displaced from their homes, mostly newly arrived ones, receive all the necessary qualified medical services in licensed medical clinics and have access to other state healthcare and social services. When necessary, MSF covers any medical care gaps and pays for the necessary medications and medical consultations.
In August 2023, our team concluded the support to the Voronezh-based NGO and started a new partnership with the Taganrog-based NGO that provides assistance to people in transit temporary accommodation centres (TACs) in Taganrog, the Rostov region. In many cases, people displaced by the conflict arrive at TACs without anything; thus, essential food, clothing, and personal hygiene items are provided to them.
Our partner NGOs' support those in need of medical and mental healthcare. Social workers from partner NGOs support people displaced by the conflict in acquiring the necessary documents for their registration within the Russian system.
Since the beginning of the activities, MSF has provided support to more than 23,600 displaced people, including more than 3,200 people who received mental health support.
MSF regularly supports local organisations who provide support to the displaced population in Belgorod, Taganrog and Rostov-on-Don with urgently needed items, e.g. food, hygiene kits and small household items. Since the beginning of the activities, more than 45,000 displaced people received essentials with the support of our partner NGOs.
MSF continues to seek access in order to provide assistance to people in Russian-controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, where the fighting is intense and humanitarian needs are understood to be significant.

Our history in Ukraine

MSF first worked in Ukraine in 1999, supporting the Ministry of Health to treat HIV. From 2011 to 2014, MSF ran a drug-resistant tuberculosis programme within the regional penitentiary system in Donetsk.

MSF responded to the conflict in eastern Ukraine from 2014 onwards and has also continued to provide specialised programmes to treat infectious diseases, such as hepatitis C.

When the current war broke out in February 2022, MSF was running a drug-resistant tuberculosis project in Zhytomyr, an HIV project in Sievierodonetsk and working to improve access to primary healthcare for people affected by conflict in eastern Ukraine. These projects were temporarily suspended as we reoriented our activities to respond to the needs created by the war.

Lubov Mykolaina, 64 years old, is a patient at the health centre in Chornobaivka supported by MSF. "I have a lot of problems right now. I feel bad. I am afraid of the shelling. I don't feel well. Since the occupation I am afraid. I feel scared, nervous, and that gives me health problems." | October 2023 © Nuria Lopez Torres

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