The war in Ukraine has been going on for 10 months, and it has devastated the lives of 7.5 million children. Now, winter bringing plummeting temperatures only intensifies the struggles.
Constant air strikes and shelling have killed more than 400 kids in Ukraine and left more than 700 with life-changing injuries, according to the United Nations.
The humanitarian organization Save the Children is working to help, sending supplies to vulnerable families.
This winter, Andrii Kryvoruchko, a senior at the University of New Haven, is focused on his studies, but his heart is with his homeland: Ukraine.
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“They are using the energy as a weapon of war,” Kryvoruchko said.
Kryvoruchko has lived in the U.S. for six years, but he has many childhood friends on the frontlines, facing winter in a war zone.
“Schools, hospitals, residential homes, they all need supply of gas and energy,” Kryvoruchko said.
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With ongoing attacks from Russia on infrastructure, people are dealing with constant power outages and left without heating, electricity, or running water.
Kryvoruchko has spoken with loved ones who abide by an energy schedule due to the blackouts.
“You will have energy supply only for four hours, and then the next four hours you might have it, or you might not have it,” he said.
These conditions are deeply concerning to Save the Children.
“Winter should never be weaponized,” Janti Soeripto, Save the Children U.S. president and CEO, based in Fairfield, said.
Teams at the Connecticut office in Fairfield are responding, collecting supplies to send to Ukraine.
“We are providing warm clothes, blankets, shelter, if needed solid fuel to people,” Soeripto said. “We're working with hospitals and schools in Ukraine and give them generators or heaters.”
They are also sending cash transfers so people can buy what they need in the moment.
Almost eight million people have fled Ukraine to surrounding European countries, and an estimated 40% of them are children, according to Save the Children. That’s just over three million children displaced.
Another estimates 6.5 million people have also fled their homes due to conflict, and are now internally displaced, according to the organization.
Save the Children fears the ongoing blackouts will lead to another wave of mass displacement.
They see the weight of war on an 8-year-old girl whose hair is starting to turn gray; in a 9-year-old that asked for peace this Christmas.
“We need to do so much more. And the situation is so much worse for kids now than even was before,” Soeripto said.
Peace in Ukraine is a consuming thought for Kryvoruchko, too.
“It's difficult to watch this all from here,” he said.
He knows that this Christmas will be a bitter one for so many of his friends back in Ukraine.
“I have been seeing many, many people in United States contributing their best to supporting Ukraine, and I'm eternally thankful for that,” Kryvoruchko said.
Contributions can be made at SaveThe Children.org.
