Russian attack on Kyiv children’s hospital underscores how urgently Ukraine needs help

Fourteen-year-old Volodymyr Shpetna was in a hospital bed in Kiev, hooked up to a dialysis machine. He looked into the distance and occasionally smiled shyly while his mother sat at the foot of his bed.

On Monday, Volodymyr was receiving his regular dialysis treatment at the Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital and had just woken up when a Russian missile hit the building where he was being treated.

His mother, Anelina Shpetna, was at work when she learned that the hospital had been attacked. She called him immediately. “Mom, I’m alive,” he said. “But I don’t know what happened to the other children in this building.”

He is afraid, “but thank God he is alive,” She told The Globe and Mail in an interview on Wednesday while sitting in a hospital where her son and dozens of other children were taken after the attack.

Russia launched a missile attack on five Ukrainian cities on Monday, including a daylight missile that hit the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital – the largest in Ukraine – which treats some of the country’s most severe children. Ukrainian officials said the attacks across the country At least 42 civilians killed.

Russian attacks kill dozens of people in Ukraine

A children’s hospital in Kiev was hit after Russia

a wave of rocket attacks on cities across Ukraine on Monday.

Ochmatdyt Children’s Hospital

UN assessment indicates deadly

The strike at the plant was caused by

Direct hit by Russian missile

Shevchenkivskyj

Residential building

At least 42 people

killed in Ukraine

Dniprovsky

Private clinic

Solomjanski

Business center

Kh-101: The Ukrainian security service says it has found wreckage

of Russian air-launched cruise missiles on hospital grounds

graphic news, sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters

Russian attacks kill dozens of people in Ukraine

A children’s hospital in Kiev was hit after Russia

a wave of rocket attacks on cities across Ukraine on Monday.

Ochmatdyt Children’s Hospital

UN assessment indicates deadly

The strike at the plant was caused by

Direct hit by Russian missile

Shevchenkivskyj

Residential building

At least 42 people

killed in Ukraine

Dniprovsky

Private clinic

Solomjanski

Business center

Kh-101: The Ukrainian security service says it has found wreckage

of Russian air-launched cruise missiles on hospital grounds

graphic news, sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters

Russian attacks kill dozens of people in Ukraine

A children’s hospital in Kiev was hit after Russia

a wave of rocket attacks on cities across Ukraine on Monday.

Ochmatdyt Children’s Hospital

UN assessment indicates deadly

The strike at the plant was caused by

Direct hit by Russian missile

Shevchenkivskyj

Residential building

At least 42 people

killed in Ukraine

Dniprovsky

Private clinic

Solomjanski

Business center

Kh-101: The Ukrainian security service says it has found wreckage

of Russian air-launched cruise missiles on hospital grounds

graphic news, sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters

Ukrainian Health Minister Viktor Liashko said on Wednesday that a boy who was in intensive care at the time of the attack had died, making him the first child victim among the patients being treated there.

Ukraine is urging its Western allies to provide it with sufficient air defenses to protect itself. Monday’s attack underscored Russia’s disregard for the Ukrainian civilian population and the urgency with which Ukraine needs help.

The attack, one of the largest against Kyiv in months, came a day before the start of a three-day summit of NATO leaders. One of the main topics of the meeting is the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked a number of Western allies on X for their commitment to supply his country with F-16 fighter jets.

“This is a clear signal that Russia’s ability to terrorize the Ukrainian population, cities and towns will continue to decline. F-16 fighter jets will also be used to reinforce Ukraine’s air defenses,” he said, adding that they will help the country protect itself from Russian attacks such as the attack on the children’s hospital.

Ian Garner: A rocket destroyed a children’s hospital in Ukraine – and Moscow’s nonsensical rhetoric

Thirty-six children were brought to the hospital where Volodymyr is being treated, said Artem Semenec, deputy director of the hospital’s medical department, who cannot be named for security reasons. He said the patients, ranging from babies to 17-year-olds, arrived with brain trauma and cuts from broken glass.

At Okhmatdyt Hospital, Anastasiia Rusyn, head of the radiology diagnostics department, pointed to blood smeared on the wall outside her office when her colleague was cut by glass. She had left her office and was no longer standing at the window. Moments before the attack.

She said the hospital was targeted because it was very popular and an attack on it would cause so much pain. “If they want to strike at the heart of Ukrainians, they will strike here because you can see the scale of the destruction and the reaction of the people,” she said.

Their work continues and some parts of Okhmatdyt are functioning. On Wednesday, Maryna Svyd, 33, and her nine-year-old son Oleksandr waited for their doctor. Ms. Svyd said she and Oleksandr were in the hospital on Monday, where he was receiving radiation treatment. They went outside and explosions rocked the town.

She and her son quickly boarded a bus organized by a foundation that supports his cancer treatment. The bus As he was driving away, the missile hit the hospital and caused the bus to rock.

“At that moment we just thanked God for saving us. My son was very calm,” she said. She said her son lives in the Kharkiv region and is used to explosions and had already been operated on under rocket fire there.

UN Security Council meets over attack on Kyiv children’s hospital

In an office in the hospital’s main building, transplant doctor and pediatric surgeon Oleg Godik said he was saddened that his colleague Svitlana Lukianchuk, a 30-year-old nephrologist, was killed in the attack.

“We will work even harder in memory of Svitlana,” he said.

Across the hospital grounds, in the children’s ward, 42-year-old Natalia Mitnichuk sat on a bed opposite her 19-year-old daughter Yuliia. They come from Zhytomyr and were on Monday eight Floor of the main hospital building on a seemingly normal morning.

Ms. Mitnichuk said her daughter has a congenital liver disease and has been receiving treatment at the hospital since she was two months old. She finally received a liver transplant in June and has been recovering at the hospital ever since.

When the air raid alarm went off, Mitnichuk said she saw people outside the window looking up at the sky. They went into the basement and a few minutes after they reached the shelter there was a huge explosion. The building shook and they were scared, she said. Eventually they went outside.

“I saw children being pulled out of the rubble and the toxicology unit building, where children in serious condition were being treated, was completely destroyed,” she said.

“The international community must stop the terrorists. Do not remain silent. Today this terror is taking place in Ukraine, and tomorrow it may take place in Britain, Poland and the Czech Republic. Russia will not stop at Ukraine alone.”