Unhygienic conditions, confinement, fear taking toll on health of students in Ukraine

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, March 1

For the last two days Harpreet Kaur, a fourth year MBBS student in Kharkiv Medical University, who hails from Jalandhar, has been suffering from high fever and headache. Reason: The freezing temperature, not enough warm clothes, starvation, dipping oxygen, unhygienic conditions in the bunkers and above all the growing fear of not returning home anytime soon.

There is just one washroom; so there is no question of maintaining hygiene even if we try hard. We are hoping to survive the war, making our best efforts to stay calm but our health isn’t supporting us anymore.

Advertisement

The escalating tension has taken away my hunger. I just want to go back to my family. The sounds of bombings, shelling and airstrikes have shaken me to the core. Students in Ukraine

Talking to The Tribune over a WhatsApp call, Harpreet in her weak voice said over 100 students are stuck here in a single bunker close to university. “There is just one washroom; so there is no question of maintaining hygiene even if we try hard. We are hoping to survive the war, making our best efforts to stay calm but our health isn’t supporting us anymore,” she said, adding that in the last two days, she has eaten twice and that too a bread.

She further said she hasn’t even informed her family about her ailing health as they are already under stress. Like Harpreet, there are many students from Punjab stranded in Kharkiv, Kyiv, Oblast, Vinnytsia and other cities of Ukraine, reeling under stress and waiting for the Indian Embassy’s response about their evacuation plan.

Another student, Gurbhaksh Kaur of Cherkasy National University, Ukraine, who hails from Nawanshahr, said she is suffering from anorexia i.e. loss of appetite. “The escalating tensions have taken away my hunger. I just want to go back to my family. The sounds of bombings, shelling and airstrikes have shaken me to the core. I never thought in my dreams that I’ll ever witness something like this. I beg the Indian government to please take us out of here,” she said.

“We are badly stuck here. We have no hygienic place here to relieve ourselves. Some girls here are on their periods but they have nothing to use,” said Loveleen Kaur of Kharkiv University, who hails from Jalandhar. She further said there were many students who were suffering from asthma and migraine and need to go outside to have fresh air but due to frequent shelling they can’t afford to go out.

The students pleaded for help saying the situation is getting really bad. They said if the war prolongs they will die of hunger and other illness, therefore, the government must make some arrangement for their immediate evacuation.

One from Jalandhar crossed Romania border

Sumit Nagrath (23), a student of National Pirogov Memorial Medical University, Vinnytsya, crossed over to Romania on Monday after two night’s wait. His father Sanjeev Nagrath said on Saturday some Ukraine contractors and Indian consultants there arranged a bus for the students to the border. “After they arrived at the border, there was a huge crowd, but fortunately my son has crossed the border now. He has been shifted to a shelter in Romania close to the border. He is now waiting for a response from the Indian Embassy and will soon board a flight to India in the next two or three days.”