Children in a pediatric hospital in Kiev suffer the traumas of war

Photos by Fadel Senna. Video by Dylan Collins. ///Kiev, 21 Mar 2022 (AFP) - The horrors of the war in Ukraine are reflected in the eyes of little Volodymyr, 13 years old, lying on a bed in a pediatric hospital in Kiev after the vehicle in which he was traveling with his family was gunned down.February 26, two days after the start of the Russian invasion, his family's blue Lada was caught in a firefight between Russian forces trying to enter the capital and Ukrainian soldiers.Shots hit the jaw, back, arm and leg of Volodymyr, who miraculously survived. His father and cousin died instantly. “She still can't walk, but the doctors told her it would be for soon,” explains exhausted Natalia, her mother, 34 years old.Before the war, she liked to play on the cell phone and walk with her dog, she recalls. Today, he remains in a hospital bed with a big scar on his face. He murmurs, in pain, that he is “fine”.” We didn't really know who was shooting,” Natalia explains, remembering the day they tried to flee. “But when the shootings stopped, we understood who was behind all that. They will be punished,” he says, angrily, touching his arm nervously. Natalia was slightly injured. “My wounds will heal. But I can't bring my husband or nephew back. I was barely six years old,” he regrets. - “Difficult, atrocious” - The pediatric hospital, the largest in Ukraine, witnesses the trauma of the war. “It's really terrible, it's difficult, it's atrocious,” denounces pediatrician Svitlana Onysko.Now, “we live in this hospital. We don't go home anymore, we're available 24 hours a day, all the time. Tomorrow, afternoon and night, we help children,” he says.Russian President Vladimir Putin justified the invasion of Ukraine with the aim of “demilitarizing” and “denazifying” it. But the conflict is causing an increasing number of civilian casualties, especially in besieged cities such as Kharkiv (east) and Mariupol (southeast). Kiev, the capital, has also been beaten, but is not currently under constant bombardment, as elsewhere. According to the city council, four children were killed and 16 injured in Kiev, Most of them hospitalized in Okhmatdyt, the pediatric hospital.Health personnel do not forget the victims of these attacks. Like a mother, who used her body as a shield to protect her month-old daughter during the bombing of her building. The doctors removed several pieces of shrapnel from him.Or the four-year-old boy, who arrived injured on a stretcher. Or the six-year-old girl who was shot in the legs in an attack in Gostomel, a city northwest of Kiev, who killed her mother.” It's difficult psychologically and morally, because it's about children,” says pediatrician Svitlana Onysko. - “Make abstraction” - In the early days of the conflict, mothers and their babies had to take refuge in the basement as soon as the anti-air sirens sounded. Despite this, the medical staff, who had no previous experience in war medicine, do their best to continue working.” Since the beginning of the war, we have had to care for the wounded, not only children but also adults, hit by missiles and fire,” says orthopedic surgeon Vlasii Pylypko. Most of his colleagues “try to abstraction,” but “maybe after the war some of us will need psychological help,” he says. Meanwhile, “we focus only on hospitalized people”, like little Volodymyr, continues.” We have to go back to surgery. It has bullets next to the spine”, assers.dk/bur/sag/es