Doctors and hospital officials have warned of a sharp increase in maternal health problems during the war. Official statistics on maternal health in Ukraine are scarce.
Doctors interviewed reported high rates of premature birth, higher cases of hypertension during pregnancy and a higher rate of caesarean sections. Doctors are trying novel ways to distract patients from the brutal sounds of war abroad, medical director of a hospital in Mykolaiv, a town near the front, says. "Normally, the birth of a new human being is happiness, and now it's anxiety," Dr. Liudmyla Solodzhuk says.