Anelina Shpetna, with her son fourteen-year-old Volodymyr, in Kyiv, where he is hooked up to a dialysis machine, on June 10. He was evacuated to the Kiev hospital after the Russian attack on the Okhmatdyt hospital. Volodymyr was in the building that was hit by the missile at the time of the attack.Olga Ivashchenko/The Globe and Mail
Fourteen-year-old Volodymyr Shpetna lay in a hospital bed in Kyiv, hooked up to a dialysis machine. He looked off into the distance, and occasionally smiled shyly as his mother sat on the end of his bed.
On Monday, Volodymyr had been receiving his regular dialysis treatment at Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital and had just woken up when a Russian missile slammed into the building where he was being treated.
His mother, Anelina Shpetna, was at work when she learned that the hospital had been attacked. She quickly called him. “Mom, I’m alive,” he said. “But I don’t know what happened with the other children in this building.”
He’s scared “but thank god he’s alive,” she told The Globe and Mail in an interview on Wednesday, sitting in a hospital where her son and dozens of other children were taken after the attack.
Russia unleashed a barrage of missiles against five Ukrainian cities on Monday, including a daytime missile that crashed into Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital – the largest in Ukraine – and which treats some of the country’s sickest children. Ukrainian officials said the attacks across the country killed at least 42 civilians.
Russian strikes kill dozens in Ukraine
A children’s hospital in Kyiv was hit after Russia launched
a wave of missile strikes against cities across Ukraine on Monday.
Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital
UN assessment suggests lethal
strike on facility was caused by
direct hit from Russian missile
Attacks reported
Shevchenkivskyi
Residential building
At least 42 people
killed across Ukraine
KYIV
Dniprovskyi
Private clinic
Presidential
Office
Solomyansky
Business centre
Zhuliany
Airport
Boryspil
Airport
RUSSIA
Russian
control
Kyiv
5km
UKRAINE
Dnipro
Dnipro
River
Kryvyi
Rih
300km
Pokrovsk
Kh-101: Ukraine’s Security Service says it found wreckage
of Russian air-launched cruise missile at hospital site
graphic news, Sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters
Russian strikes kill dozens in Ukraine
A children’s hospital in Kyiv was hit after Russia launched
a wave of missile strikes against cities across Ukraine on Monday.
Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital
UN assessment suggests lethal
strike on facility was caused by
direct hit from Russian missile
Attacks reported
Shevchenkivskyi
Residential building
At least 42 people
killed across Ukraine
KYIV
Dniprovskyi
Private clinic
Presidential
Office
Solomyansky
Business centre
Zhuliany
Airport
Boryspil
Airport
RUSSIA
Russian
control
Kyiv
5km
UKRAINE
Dnipro
Dnipro
River
Kryvyi
Rih
300km
Pokrovsk
Kh-101: Ukraine’s Security Service says it found wreckage
of Russian air-launched cruise missile at hospital site
graphic news, Sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters
Russian strikes kill dozens in Ukraine
A children’s hospital in Kyiv was hit after Russia launched
a wave of missile strikes against cities across Ukraine on Monday.
Attacks reported
Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital
UN assessment suggests lethal
strike on facility was caused by
direct hit from Russian missile
Shevchenkivskyi
Residential building
At least 42 people
killed across Ukraine
KYIV
Dniprovskyi
Private clinic
Presidential
Office
Solomyansky
Business centre
Zhuliany
Airport
Boryspil
Airport
RUSSIA
Russian
control
Kyiv
5km
UKRAINE
Dnipro
Dnipro
River
Kryvyi
Rih
300km
Pokrovsk
Kh-101: Ukraine’s Security Service says it found wreckage
of Russian air-launched cruise missile at hospital site
graphic news, Sources: AP, BBC, ISW, Kyiv Independent, Reuters
Ukraine’s Health Minister Viktor Liashko said Wednesday that a boy who was in the intensive care unit at the time of the attack has died, becoming the first child victim among patients there.
Ukraine has been urging its Western allies to provide it with sufficient air defence to protect itself. Monday’s attack underscored Russia’s disregard for Ukrainian civilians and the urgency with which Ukraine needs help.
The attack, one of the largest against Kyiv in months, came a day before NATO leaders began a three-day summit. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is one of the focuses of the meeting.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked a number of Western allies on X for committing to provide his country with F-16 fighter jets.
“This is a clear signal that Russia’s ability to terrorize Ukrainian people, cities and communities will continue to reduce. F-16s will also be used to bolster Ukraine’s air defence,” he said adding that they will help the country protect itself from Russian attacks, such as the strike on the children’s hospital.
Ian Garner: A missile destroyed a children’s hospital in Ukraine – and Moscow’s nonsensical rhetoric
Thirty-six children were evacuated to the hospital where Volodymyr is receiving treatment, said Artem Semenec, deputy director of the medical department at the hospital, which cannot be named for security reasons. He said patients, ranging from babies to 17-year-olds, arrived with brain trauma and cuts from shards of glass.
Inside the Okhmatdyt hospital, Anastasiia Rusyn, chief of the radiology diagnostic department, pointed out blood smeared on the wall outside her office from when glass cut her colleague. She had left her office, and was away from the window, moments before the attack.
She said the hospital was targeted because it is beloved and striking it would inflict so much pain. “If they want to hurt Ukrainians in the heart, they will hit here because you can see the scale of destruction and how people react,” she said.
Maryna Svyd and her son Oleksandr, 9, wait for the first radiation therapy treatment for cancer patients offered since the attack on the Okhmatdyt hospital, on July 10.Olga Ivashchenko/The Globe and Mail
Their work continues, and some parts of Okhmatdyt are functioning. On Wednesday, Maryna Svyd, 33, and her nine-year-old son Oleksandr, were waiting to see their doctor. Ms. Svyd said that on Monday, she and Oleksandr were at the hospital where he was receiving radiation treatment. They went outside and explosions began rocking the city.
She and her son quickly got on a bus that was arranged by a foundation that supports his cancer treatment. The bus started driving away when the missile struck the hospital, causing the bus to shake.
“At that moment, we only thanked God for saving us. My son was very calm,” she said. Living in Kharkiv region, she said, her son is used to explosions and had previously been operated on there under rocket fire.
UN Security Council to meet over attack on Kyiv children’s hospital
In an office inside the hospital’s main building, Oleg Godik, a transplant physician and pediatric surgeon, said he is hurting because his colleague Svitlana Lukianchuk, a 30-year-old nephrologist, was killed in the attack.
“We will work even harder in the memory of Svitlana,” he said.
The National Children's Specialized Hospital 'Okhmatdyt' in Kyiv after the Russian attack, on July 10.Olga Ivashchenko/The Globe and Mail
Across the hospital grounds inside the pediatric department, Natalia Mitnichuk, 42, sat on a bed opposite her 19-year-old daughter, Yuliia. They are from Zhytomyr and, on Monday, they were on the eighth floor of the main hospital building on what seemed like an ordinary morning.
Ms. Mitnichuk said her daughter has a congenital disorder that affects her liver and has received treatment from this hospital since she was two months old. She finally had a liver transplant in June and had been recovering at the hospital.
When the air alarm sounded, Ms. Mitnichuk said, she saw people outside of the window looking at the sky. They went to the basement and minutes after making it to the shelter, there was a powerful explosion. The building was shaking and they were terrified, she said. Eventually, they went outside.
“I saw how children were taken out from under the rubble, that the building of the toxicology department, where children in serious condition were treated, was completely destroyed,” she said.
“The world community must stop the terrorists. Do not be silent. Today this terror is happening in Ukraine, and tomorrow it can happen in Britain, Poland, Czech Republic. Russia will not stop only at Ukraine.”