Наталія Лелюх Natalia Leliyukh

“We travel to such villages where the whole village... for example, we arrived in Kamyanka, it's in the Kharkiv region, where there are thirty mines in a yard, where even the sappers haven't worked yet. Where a pack of a thousand dogs and no less than a thousand cats run around, stepping on landmines, and only four people live there. Only four people remain in this huge village. And we found them, helped them, provided assistance and medications. But no one else will go there because it's very dangerous. There... there are still... there are people buried in the yards. And the dogs were gnawing on a small human tibia bone. And there's also a nearby silo where the grain rots. It was rotting then, it was autumn. It got flooded, the roof was pierced, it was raining, and the grain got soaked. And it was rotting, and decaying grain has this putrid smell, the smell of a protein decomposing. And this stench just hangs over the village. No one is there, dogs with bones in their mouths... And you understand that you're somewhere there, somewhere in an unclear place. Russia... and it really... again, I'll say the phrase “pisses me off” that you see that the Russians who lived there, they stood there, it's not just something that happened by chance. They deliberately break things. They deliberately make a mess. They deliberately do something disgusting. In plain terms, you come in, and there's shit on the table just because they felt like it. So, all these things... they not only annoy you, they just... you understand who we're at war with. Yes, we can't underestimate them, from their perspective... they do have some units, some directions... amazing military ones, and that's why we can't immediately defeat them there. If they were all fools, it would be understandable that something would happen. But you just see this contempt for people, contempt for achievements, contempt for culture. And, of course, it really upsets me. And another strange observation is that when you're there, you see all this horror, and it's not scary. But when you see it on TV or even our own videos... Yes, we film videos there, take some photos. When you later watch it on the screen, and especially on a TV screen, I don't watch it, but God forbid, when you watch it there, it gives you chills”.

“Village Bezruky. Where there has been no electricity for five months, where the outpatient clinic has remained, it survived. But there is... there is no one to work. There is a nurse’s assistant, and then later a nurse appeared. We arrived, started asking who needs help, what, where... And we were given certain addresses. We went there, looked at these people. And then they say: “There are a few houses beyond the railway, and in one of the houses, there is an elderly couple. They both have diabetes and they really need someone to check on them”. Plus 40 degrees outside, heat, August, everything as expected. Explosions on the horizon, drones flying above us periodically. We arrive there. I enter this house. There are a grandmother and grandfather, the grandmother is around 80, the grandfather even older. I check their blood sugar levels. Hers, with diabetes it should be around 8, but hers is 25. And she feels very unwell. I ask: “Do you have insulin?” She says: “We do have insulin, but it should be kept in cold. There is no electricity, the refrigerators are not working, we keep it in the cellar.” Well, in the cellar, it's about 15 degrees, so this insulin is no longer effective. It doesn't work. I leave them insulin pens that are stored at a temperature of 24, explain how to use them, and tell the husband everything. And after that—it was such a difficult trip—we go back to Kharkiv. And they tell us, they call Tania, they say: “There is an opportunity today to meet with the head of the Kharkiv Department of Health. <...> And you happen to... you've been in Kharkiv region for three days now, you have something to tell him. Maybe you go there and tell him”. And we're like: “Of course, yes, we'll come now”. We arrive. And in our team—it's a small team—I'm the only doctor, I'm the only one with medical education. And we come in, a beautiful office, everything is fine, a nice chart, a chart showing what's occupied, what's not... And then: thank you, you are such good people. We ask: “What about humanitarian aid?”—"With humanitarian aid, everything is bad”. Or rather, it's like “everything is bad”. They have solutions and some consumables for surgeries. But through the “Accessible Medicines” system, no one sends humanitarian aid from abroad because these are medications that cannot be bought there without a prescription. Therefore, in order to deliver them, it requires a complex transfer scheme. And they don't receive these medications. And what we do is simply distribute them directly to people and give them medication for blood pressure, diabetes, and other conditions. And he says: “Look, I have everything set up so well. Yesterday, I had discussions about VR goggles, about telemedicine, that our patients in Kharkiv will be consulted from Los Angeles. Look at how beautiful and cool everything is here". And sitting next to me is Tania Tymoshenko—former director of “Dobrobut” [a network of private medical clinics]. She was one of the organizers of disaster medicine, and now she works at the WHO. And she's holding my leg under the table. In other words, she understands that I'm turning red, that I'm going to... I'm going to go all out and show everyone. She's holding my leg, saying: “Natasha, calm down”. I can't take it anymore, I say: “What VR goggles are you talking about? We have just been in a village where there is no electricity, no insulin, and people are dying from diabetes. They don't need consultations from Los Angeles at all. They need insulin, electricity, refrigerators, or some mobile medical teams that come there, provide medical assistance, leave medications, and go back. Because we came from Kyiv to you. Do you have cars in Kharkiv? There are cars. Why can't you put doctors in them and send them there?” “Because they're shooting there, they won't go there”. “I understand. Have you asked? Maybe there is someone who would go? Because I go there, I go as a volunteer, nobody pays me any money for it. I go because I can't do otherwise”. And he says: “I can't find anyone, nobody goes”. I say: “Then why the hell do you need VR goggles when you can't even provide basic necessities for your territory?” In short, it's about what can be changed”.

“At that time, I had this thought: why do I need to know any political stuff? Why do I need it? After all, my profession is completely apolitical. And of course, Maidan changed that a lot. It changed it significantly. When you first see something real... you see people who could really die right next to you. We were on duty at the library on Hrushevskoho Street on the night of the storming of that building... My goodness, where the Lenin Museum used to be... the Ukrainian House. And when it was minus 16 degrees Celsius and there were fire hydrants with water. And boys were brought to the library on Hrushevskoho Street. By the time they were brought, they were already in an icy crust. And we... we broke the ice together with their clothes off them, we had warmed solutions, we started dripping warm solutions in them, started rubbing them. They regained consciousness. They asked: “Do you have any clothes?” — “Yes”. They dressed up and went back out. “Where are you going?!” — “No, no. We're going there”. You saw all these people who were ready... And you know what was the scariest thing for me at Maidan? Imagine, the library on Hrushevskoho Street. We were right in that lobby. We had four surgery tables. Some kind of storage for something... And we were operating there, providing assistance, doing everything. But to go to the toilet, you had to go... the toilet was a bit around the corner. And the windows of the toilets faced the Lobanovskyi Stadium, where the riot police [special law enforcement forces] were stationed. You approach... The first time I went to the toilet, excuse me for such details. I approach the toilet, and there's a sign on it: “Do not turn on the lights. Snipers are active”. And you no longer want to go to the toilet, that's it”.

“And the time came to receive some assignment. We came, I came, together with my boss, we went to Bohatyriov. We went and said that... He says: “Here's Natasha, she's in our department, she does shifts, she's a smart girl. We would like to take her as an assistant in our department”. They say to me: “Do you have $10,000?” I say: “No”. He says: “Well, sorry, I have someone who can pay that money”. And that's it, I left, my boss left, he felt uncomfortable. I see how he feels. I say: “It's alright, we'll figure it out”. Later, for about a month, I couldn't come and get my things from the locker room, and I realized that I needed to look for something. My (at that time, we were not living together anymore) ex-husband had some connections in the city health department [Department of Health of the Kyiv City State Administration], no, not in the city health department, but in the regional health department [Department of Health of the Kyiv Regional State Administration], because I had a registration in the Kyiv region. And thanks to this registration in the Kyiv region, through the regional health department... they said: “Go to this office, talk there. And take $1,500 with you”. I had $1,500 that I had saved. I understood that when I would be assigned, it wouldn't be free, it would be for money. And I went there, they said: “Okay, here are two positions: there's a position for a pediatric anesthesiologist-intensivist and a position for an obstetrician-gynecologist”. There was no surgery”.