Solidarity
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Emergency contraceptives, abortion pills… A UN agency and the International Planned Parenthood Federation are getting together to meet the needs of Ukrainian women and in particular victims of sexual violence.
More than two months after the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine, testimonies of sexual violence, in particular war rapes, are multiplying and beginning to be documented. “The needs of women and girls are increasing, but health services for women who have experienced sexual violence, including rape, are becoming scarcer on the ground,” notes Jaime Nadal, representative in Ukraine of UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund) in a press release sent to Release. He pursues : “Settlements have been damaged or destroyed, and resources are limited or diverted to meet the needs of displaced people.”
This UN agency thus provided “over 40 tons of reproductive health supplies, medicines and equipment” to hospitals and mobile teams in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro and Zaporizhia. This medical equipment includes in particular “33 Clinical Rape Management Kits” consisting of pregnancy tests, emergency contraceptives, preventive treatments for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and post-exposure treatments for HIV. The latter were dispatched to 19 hospitals in ten Ukrainian regions “thus enabling health services to provide vital services to …