ChildAid has been running for 50 years and works exclusively with children in Russia, Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine to try and alleviate extreme poverty and help children who are abandoned, exposed to abuse, trapped in a cycle of violence or poverty or living with learning or physical disabilities.

The needs of children living in Eastern Europe have been immense, but were amplified by the Russian invasion in February 2022. According to Unicef, more than half of Ukrainian children were displaced after one month of war.

ChildAid responded by providing food parcels, hygiene packs, bedding, mattresses, medicines for the flow of refugees, as well as transport for those seeking to get further away from their homeland.

In Kamianske, there were many food shortages but ChildAid continued to provide what they could to vulnerable families. This city is just north of Dnipro and extremely vulnerable to military incursions. A nurse who is part of the ChildAid team continued at the Children’s Hospital caring for abandoned babies and one of the team in the baby orphanage remained in the city.

In Moldova, the Tony Hawks Centre worked closely with the authorities to provide what assistance that could to the near 20,000 refugees in Chisinau. They expressly offered support for children coming over who were living with disabilities.