Germany pledges medical aid to Ukraine

German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach speaks during a session of Germany’s lower house of parliament, as the Bundestag is set to vote on several proposals introducing or blocking a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine mandate for the general population, in Berlin, Germany, April 7, 2022. REUTERS/Lisi Niesner

BERLIN, June 10 (Reuters) – Germany will help Ukraine provide medical help for war victims by helping build trauma centres for the wounded, donating prosthetic limbs and deploying German doctors to the country, Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said on Friday.

“Ukraine needs humanitarian aid just as urgently as it needs our military support,” the minister said during a visit to the western Ukrainian city of Lviv.

The aid would include Germany helping to supply prostheses, deploying 200 doctors in Ukraine, setting up training on treating burns and connecting some hospitals in Ukraine to a telemedicine service, the ministry said in a statement.

Germany’s largest artificial limb maker, Ottobock, is already in talks with the health ministry to help produce and fit prostheses in mobile container workshops and train orthopaedic specialists directly in Ukraine, a company spokesperson said.

“Ottobock has partners in Ukraine and continues to supply products there, and the container workshops could make supplies possible wherever the network was destroyed by war,” he said.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says some 290 attacks on healthcare facilities have been recorded since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began on Feb. 24.

The German government has provided Ukraine with medical aid worth around 100 million euros ($105.76 million) so far and Germany’s healthcare industry donated over 100 million euros, the ministry added.

($1 = 0.9455 euros)

Reporting by Zuzanna Szymanska and Alexander Ratz
Editing by Frances Kerry

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