When Russian bombers flew low over her city and the bombing became unbearable, Lyudmila Kravtsova packed her things in a small suitcase and took the train to safer western Ukraine.
The wagon was full of children and women, and the fighting men, who were left behind to face the Russian forces, were virtually absent from the flight train. But so is another section of Ukrainian society.
Kravtsova, a 67-year-old retired accountant, says she was one of three older passengers.
“The elderly do not go anywhere and (live) with the war as their only companion,” she says.
One in four people in Ukraine is over 60 years old, according to government statistics, and many of them were already poor and vulnerable before the Russian invasion on February 24, according to the United Nations and other experts.
About three million Ukrainians have since fled the country, but many older people are too ill or immobile to make the arduous journey. Others have refused to leave their beloved homes, even if their conflict has circled.
Ukraine has the highest rate of war-affected elderly population of any country, according to HelpAge International, a global network of support groups operating in the former Soviet republic since 2014.
The same source states that older people are often neglected during humanitarian crises or their special nutritional or medical needs are not taken into account.
“Especially in rural areas of Ukraine, the majority of those left behind are older and providing assistance to those as the conflict escalates will be a challenge,” said Justin Derbyshire, head of HelpAge International.
“There will be a huge need. We will see huge problems related to hunger and medical supplies.”
Many older people, already in fragile health, have arrived in Lviv, western Ukraine, where Russian forces have not attempted to date.
Kravtsova spent many days terrified inside an underground shelter in the small town of Barvinkove in eastern Ukraine with rockets and shells exploding outside. “We had such a beautiful life before the war,” he says.
About a day later he was sitting on a bench outside the Lviv train station waiting for Oxana’s daughter.
Asked why she looks so cheerful, she answers that she just met a wounded soldier who had returned from the front. “He told me, ‘We will win this war.’ And I believe him.”
She says she will stay with her daughter in Ternopil, a neighboring town, and will not go abroad. “If I were younger, I might consider going abroad. But this is my land.”
“So exhausted”
Boris Mosir, 79, who is walking with a cane, is sitting quietly in a nearby lounge with his son Ihor.
They lived together in Izium, another city in eastern Ukraine that has been hit by Russian forces.
The residential complex where they lived has no shelter or basement. During the almost non-stop bombing, they hid in the bathroom with pillows on their heads.
“I can not believe we survived. We are so exhausted. We just want to sit down and take a breath,” said the 79-year-old.
Mosir suffers from prostate cancer, but says he has run out of medication to treat it.
He had scheduled a medical visit to a hospital in neighboring Kharkiv, but this city, the second largest in the country, has been destroyed by Russian bombing.
“I do not know if my doctor is alive or dead,” he said.
The war has also created new challenges for 78-year-old Yuri Vasco, confined to a wheelchair.
He and his son-in-law Serhiy Krylov left Mykolaiv, a port city on the Black Sea that has become the scene of heavy Russian attacks.
Vasco wanted to go to his daughter Raisa who lives in neighboring Poland, but his son-in-law could not take him there, because men of fighting age are not allowed to leave Ukraine.
And so Vasco took refuge in a church in Lviv for three days to sleep there waiting for his daughter to come to take him with her to Poland.
Vasco, who suffered a stroke a few years ago, says he feels betrayed by Russia and disappointed with his own country.
“The elderly do not need them at all,” he says, trying to hide his tears.
SOURCE: AMPE
Source: Capital
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