Nelly Furtado and Timbaland sing Promiscuous in the big Toyota Tundra driving behind a trailer truck loaded with 20 tons of humanitarian aid.
Direction Balaklia, in the northeast, in a devastated region liberated in September by the Ukrainian army, after more than six months of ruthless Russian occupation. This is where Izioum is, another martyr city razed by the invader.
It will be necessary to cross dangerous zones, where there is still shelling of Russian weapons, to come to the rescue of tens of thousands of people. Shells are still raining down in Koupiansk, not far away.
At the wheel, Christian Carrer, a French pediatrician. With his partner Tetyana Grebenchykova, he directs the International Association for Medical Cooperation (IAMC), which notably receives assistance from the Canada-Ukraine Foundation and the Ontario government.
The three-vehicle convoy will take more than five hours to travel from the Poltava warehouse to Balaklia, a distance of just 200 km, but over cracked, gunfire-damaged roads with countless military checkpoints. – because we still fear Russian infiltration and many weapons circulate.
As early as 2014, this well-built guy with a tough face was on the ground to help the victims of the Donbass region, not far from there, invaded by the Russians.
Last January, he suspected that the dangerous neighbor was up to something.
“There were bizarre groupings and constant provocations, he says while driving. Everyone knew clearly something was going to happen. »
His organization then began to pre-position various items, including bandages.
“Those who finance us had confidence in us, because we had anticipated the aggression. »
An organization that knows the terrain
Donors are as much French as American or British. Canada is the third most generous to the IMCA.
“We delivered to the last hospital on the morning of February 24 (the day the Russians started the war),” said the doctor, who adds that one of his collaborators was practically in the war zone at the time and the Russian planes were flying. over his head.
The AICM is therefore well equipped and knows the terrain. The organization focuses its targeted assistance on just a few oblasts in the northeast, 3,200 locations to serve in six regions.
It has more than 800 “references” in its directory, compared to 250 for a normal pharmacy: general or specialized drugs that hospitals, dispensaries and pharmacies in disaster areas can order. Two pharmacists and a doctor manage the stocks.
Even if these regions are officially liberated, they are in the most complete dereliction.
On the road, right in the middle of immense plains, a succession of modest villages with destroyed or repaired dwellings, gas stations and closed businesses, sometimes dilapidated apartment towers from the Soviet era, fields whose crops could not be harvested.
A constant hum comes from the rolling of the tires: the road has been jagged by the incessant passage of heavy tanks and their tracks.
The suffering and destruction of war can be heard and seen everywhere.
The inhabitants no longer have anything to live on. The occupier has emptied the pharmacies, ransacked the hospitals, and the supply of food is largely insufficient.
“The Russians took everything”
We cross Shugouyev, a municipality where the AICM had prepositioned medicines, but which was occupied. “The Russians took everything,” laments Dr. Carrer.
The health of the people who had to live for weeks in the shelters turns out to be pitiful. They look like “zombies”, they even lose their teeth sometimes, and the doctors from outside who came on the spot were shocked, says the humanitarian professional.
The vulnerability of pregnant women, young children and young mothers particularly affects this pediatrician who has made it one of his missions: a good part of the delivery of the day is intended for them.
Arrival in Balaklia, a desolate locality, with some completely gutted buildings. In particular, acts of torture have been reported there.
It is there, in an old warehouse, that aid worth US$3 million will be unloaded, to then be distributed in eight surrounding municipalities.
The IMCA refuses to distribute aid directly to people in need.
“There are administrations (authorities) for that, physical distribution is not for us”, justified Christian Carrer, who pleads for the protection of the anonymity of the patients he helps.
“It’s a matter of respect for people who are in trouble. We have respect for them. It could happen to us one day too. »
A small welcoming committee is there, including the head of the Izium district administration, Stepan Maselski.
“This aid is very important, because we are still at war,” he said in an interview with The Canadian Press.
“The invader destroyed our infrastructure. Two days ago, we had neither electricity nor water. The occupation was painful, no medicine, no medical supplies, no good food. »
A few crates destined for area hospitals are immediately transferred from the Toyota pickup truck to a van.
A forklift takes care of emptying the trailer truck of its huge pallets. Boxes and boxes of medicines for people with chronic ailments, epilepsy, heart problems, anesthetics for surgery, all kinds of surgical equipment, orthoses, bandages, gloves, stethoscopes, diapers for adults and for children, etc
And Similac infant formula, because child malnutrition is very widespread, deplores the pediatrician.
“Often women who have given birth find it difficult to breastfeed, due to the stress and the context,” he explained. Ontario has also provided vitamins and their effect has been almost miraculous, he confirms.
In addition, food boxes including everything you need to cook well in Ukraine have been made for residents and refugees in the area, in addition to toilet kits for all those women and men who have lost everything. .
Some end up in school gymnasiums in poor villages, where people live, barely dressed and who haven’t even had time to take the necessities, says the doctor.
There are even crates of food for animals, because it is rare here: everywhere we see Ukrainians who bring in transport, trains, buses, their little companions whom they consider as members of the family.
Huge needs in all hospitals
A very special large red bag, which looks a bit like an insulated delivery bag, is given to Paulina, a medical officer who intervenes throughout the territory for emergency care. It is a kind of very complete care kit designed by doctors in California for disaster areas, with different kits to treat whether it is an injury caused by a mine or a heart attack.
“These supplies are of much better quality for the citizens who really need them here,” she explained.
Unloading is suddenly interrupted. Forklift failure.
But the Ukrainians are “patented”: they tow the old machine with a tractor, as they have done so often in viral videos with Russian tanks, and they improvise a rickety wooden ramp to finish emptying the pallets of the truck.
Counting on the resourcefulness of the Ukrainians, the AICM has also delivered large quantities of warm blankets as well as small black wood stoves manufactured in the Poltava region. Because many citizens have nothing left to heat themselves due to power outages, so they will be able to install this rudimentary heating.
But if the Ukrainian state has shown such resilience and agility, then why does it not still provide basic services to its population in its liberated territories?
The answer is complex. The health budget had to be cut by 18-20% due to the war effort, says Carrer, who has lived in Ukraine since 2006.
Also, their annual endowment of equipment and funding comes in February March and that’s when the Russian invasion took place. Refugees also come to drain the resources calculated according to the local populations.
“There are enormous needs in all hospitals, notes the French doctor. And now it’s serious, we see the hospitals coming to the end of their tether. We used to deliver two boxes to them, now we deliver them pallets, basic things, plaster, gloves, cotton. »
Night falls quickly. It is cold. The truck is now emptied and we have to leave, go through all the checkpoints again towards Poltava.
Christian Carrer already knows that the AICM will have to return soon with another loadout.
“Either a good soul is there to help, or they’ll call us back in a month. […] We are the first to help and perhaps the last to help. »