Easter is coming. A holiday to commemorate resurrection, life over death. Our thoughts cannot fail to go with those living in dark times, facing suffering and death every day. As Pope Francis keeps reminding us, every conflict, every war is a sacrilege, an atrocity we have to stop fuel before it destroys human beings. Everywhere in the world. From Ethiopia to Northern Mozambique, from South Sudan to Central African Republic up to that one closer to us, in Ukraine. We are constantly, deeply, dedicated to our mission in Africa. That is where our heart and life are. Nevertheless, we are now called to show solidarity also to the nearest mile.
Chinisau e Chernivsti: these are the cities from which our health workers received a deafening appeal for help. Specific interventions. Something we are capable of in a country we are just getting to know; interventions implemented according to our mission, addressing primary health needs while working alongside local authorities; cautiously yet concretely.
Chernivsti is a small town in the north-western part of Ukraine not yet bombed. There, 200.000 inhabitants have welcomed 150.000 internally displaced people. All the schools have been converted into shelters. We are helping five hospital and a local NGO here, providing them equipment and drugs that are essential yet hard to find. Moreover, thanks to 4 ambulances donated by Regione Veneto, we are setting an emergency service to transfer the most vulnerable from inland areas to this town; they are pregnant women, children and elderly.
In Chinisau, the capital of Moldavia, the first Cuamm doctor arrived on April 3rd. His name is Paolo and he is setting up a mobile clinic in a reception centre hosted in a church. The clinic will support the Moldovan health system, that is approaching the breaking point, providing primary health care to refugees fleeing from the south.
I received a message from our colleague Giovanna, who is working on this intervention and has just returned from Ukraine:
«Life must go on, one way or another. While we hope that the war end soon, we also believe that the pain and grief caused can only be mend with love, peace and humanity. Never forgetting that we are brothers and sisters living in the same world and that humanity will win over atrocities. This is what I have seen and heard and witnessed spending my time with Natalia and Katharina in Ukraine, but also with Anastasia and her children, refugees from Odessa who arrived in Chisinau. Life and love will win».
Sure that Life and Love will win, I wish you
HAPPY EASTER!
D.Dante
PS. If you want to know what we do every day to “play our part”, you can follow the stories from Moldova and Ukraine.
