As the crisis in Ukraine intensifies, medical aid infusions from Direct Relief into the besieged country continue, with another 13 shipping pallets of urgently needed items departing today.
The shipment contains medicine and supplies requested explicitly by Ukraine’s Ministry of Health, including medical oxygen concentrators, antibiotics, wound dressings, and respiratory medicine. It also includes more than 100 field medic packs, stocked with critical care resources like sutures and combat-application tourniquets.
The shipment is the second to depart Direct Relief’s warehouse this week. More than 300 emergency medical backpacks arrived yesterday in Poland for transport into Ukraine.
Health issues often arise during mass evacuations when people cannot access regular health care and the prescriptions they need to manage chronic conditions like diabetes and high blood pressure.
The availability of insulin is of particular concern. An estimated 12,000-15,000 children in Ukraine live with Type 1 diabetes. Without insulin, a person with Type 1 diabetes can live little more than a week.
Other health concerns include the continued spread of Covid-19 as more people are forced into close quarters as they seek shelter and other infectious diseases like polio and HIV/AIDS.
Businesses Step up
Direct Relief anticipates a rapid scaling up of medical relief to Ukraine in the near term, as dozens of medical manufacturers lend their support.
Among them is Eli Lilly and Co., which is donating a supply of baricitinib, used to treat Covid-19-related complications.
Merck is donating 100,000 courses of its investigational Covid-19 therapy to Direct Relief for distribution to refugees in low- and middle-income countries, including people affected by the conflict in Ukraine.
According to the Wall Street Journal, GlaxoSmithKline is also donating doses of the antibiotic Augmentin and the painkiller Panadol.
“The drugs will be included alongside medicine from other drugmakers and items such as wound dressings in emergency medical packs assembled by Direct Relief, a humanitarian group that provides medical supplies in disaster zones. Glaxo, like other drugmakers, typically donates medicines during humanitarian crises,” the news outlet reported Thursday.
FedEx is also working with Direct Relief to provide in-kind support of a charter flight containing medical aid.
Direct Relief has supported hospitals in Ukraine for years before the invasion. Since 2021, the organization has shipped over $27 million in medical aid to Ukraine. The most recent cache of assistance arrived a week before the invasion. It contained $5.4 million worth of cardiovascular drugs requested by a Ukrainian NGO that serves hospitals, ambulance stations and medical centers.
In the News
Associated Press: How to help Ukrainians affected by the Russian invasion
The New York Times: How You Can Help Ukraine
The Wall Street Journal: Microsoft, SpaceX, Airbnb and Others Offer Ukraine Assistance
The Los Angeles Times: Want to help Ukraine? These California organizations need your support
