Ukraine has shortages of basic medical supplies and has had to freeze urgent efforts to tackle a polio outbreak since Russia invaded the country, according to public health experts.
Medical needs are already high with the World Health Organization (WHO) warning on Sunday that oxygen supplies are running low.
Fears of a wider public health crisis are growing as citizens flee their homes, health services are affected and supplies do not reach Ukraine, which has also been hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
WHO spokesman Tariq Jasarevic said Monday that routine immunization and polio control efforts had been suspended in Ukraine because of the war. The WHO has also received reports that coronavirus vaccination campaigns have also been suspended in many parts of the country, he said.
Last October, Ukraine identified the first case of polio in Europe in five years – a paralyzed 17-month-old baby – and another case of paralysis was identified in January.
Nineteen more children have been vaccinated against the polio-derived strain of polio, but show no symptoms of paralysis.
A national polio vaccination campaign to cover the 100,000 children who remain unvaccinated in Ukraine began on February 1, but has been suspended since the start of the war as health authorities have turned to emergency medical care.
The WHO said power shortages in some areas had affected the safety of vaccine stocks.
“The WHO is working to develop urgent emergency plans to support Ukraine and prevent further spread of war-induced polio,” Jasarevic said.
Russia has described its actions in Ukraine as a “special operation” to undermine its neighbor’s military capabilities and capture dangerous nationalists as it denies targeting civilians.
CONCERN ABOUT HIV PATIENTS
The United Nations Office on HIV and AIDS has announced that Ukraine has stockpiles of drugs for HIV patients for less than a month.
“Patients living with HIV in Ukraine have a few weeks of antiretroviral therapy left and without continued access their lives are in danger,” said Winnie Bianima, executive director of UNAIDS (the United Nations Joint Program on HIV and AIDS).
Prior to the Russian invasion last week, there were 250,000 people living with HIV in Ukraine, the second largest number in Europe after Russia.
The country also had high rates of tuberculosis, including one of the highest rates of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis in the world.
It is estimated that every year 30,000 new cases of tuberculosis are recorded in the country.
The government and the international organization “Stop TB Partnership” announced yesterday that all tuberculosis clinics remain open, but patients have been given supplies of drugs that will last a month to take with them in case the condition worsens or become dangerous to go to the clinic.
Adequate treatment is available for existing patients and those predicted to become ill by the end of 2022, according to Stop TB, although the organization is working with the WHO on the possibility of emergency orders for neighboring countries.
Experts say that interruptions in treatment or diagnosis can increase the spread of the disease but also endanger the lives of patients.
COVID-19 is also a cause for concern, with just over one in three people being fully vaccinated against the virus.
Daily news cases peaked at around 40,000 in February, but had begun to decline before the Russian invasion, when reports stopped.
The humanitarian aid organization Project HOPE announced yesterday that pharmacies in all the cities under attack report that their medical supplies are running out.
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