Russian forces have repeatedly struck medical facilities across Ukraine, with more than 2,000 strikes on medical facilities and 81 strikes affecting maternal care and delivery rooms. A March 2022 airstrike on a Mariupol maternity hospital wounded many and resulted in the later deaths of heavily pregnant Iryna Kalinina and her unborn baby. A recent missile strike killed seven-months-pregnant Diana Koshyk. Frontline maternity hospitals operate under constant threat from drones, artillery and ballistic missiles and deliberate degradation of infrastructure. Millions of women and children have fled, many remain fearful of pregnancy and childbirth, and Ukraine now faces a collapsing birthrate and rising mortality.
It was one of the most horrifying targets of Russia's war on Ukraine so far. Reports showed a pregnant woman on a stretcher, her face ashen with shock, legs smeared with blood and a hand holding her bump. Behind her, the bombed-out ruins of Mariupol's maternity hospital. More than a dozen people, including women in labour, were injured in the attack in March 2022. The woman photographed, Iryna Kalinina, later died along with her unborn baby.
At each hospital, women and the staff working there face terrible danger: circling drones, artillery, ballistic missiles and the targeted degradation of healthcare infrastructure. They risk themselves to bring new life into a country where there are now three deaths for every birth. Even with renewed hopes for an end to the war, Russia's brutal tactics have fuelled a demographic crisis for Ukraine.
#maternity-hospital-attacks #maternal-mortality #demographic-crisis #displacement-and-birthrate-decline
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