Since the beginning of the conflict in Ukraine (February 24, 2022) to date, AMU – together with AFN representing the Emergency Coordination of the Focolare Movement – has undertaken numerous actions starting from the immediate collaboration with Caritas-Spes Ukraine. After the first immediate interventions, a second phase of support to the Ukrainian population was started also alongside other local partners. Medical assistance in the two regions of Kharkiv and Vinnytsia is part of this second phase.
Kharkiv region
One of the main problems in the Kharkiv region is access to medical care: overcrowding in hospitals, lack of adequate equipment and the constant threat of shelling prevent the population from seeking treatment. With the support of the AMU , some itinerant medical teams travel throughout the region , offering free visits and medicines to those in need.
At Hanna’s house, suffering from multiple sclerosis
The medical team also reached Hanna , in the city of Kharkiv, the capital of the region of the same name. Hanna is a thirty-six-year-old woman, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis about ten years ago. 
Her condition gradually deteriorated until the disease confined her to bed.
Unfortunately, over time, she has also lost the ability to communicate. Her two elderly parents take care of her, but they also have serious health problems. With the war, the situation of this family has worsened. In Hanna’s house, the medical team has left medicines and hygiene products.
Mykola, a displaced person without care
Mykola comes from the city of Bakhmut (in the Donetsk region) which is the site of violent military clashes between Russian and Ukrainian armed forces. When the
Russians occupied his city, he lost everything and together with his wife he fled that region in search of a safer place . The two took refuge in Kharkiv, in a two-room apartment that a generous person made available to them. They have no relatives to turn to for help. They are alone and live thanks to the help of humanitarian organizations. Mykola is an elderly man – 77 years old – with several health problems, recently neglected. The doctor Oleksandr examined him thoroughly, prescribed and provided him with the medicines he urgently needed free of charge.
