WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th April, 2022) A group of pediatric cardiologists from the US-based Cardiac Alliance conducted an emergency trip to Ukraine to operate on several critically ill babies, the group's leader Bill Novik told Sputnik.
"The team operated on six (patients), including three newborns, two infants less than 5 months old and one three-year-old child," Novick said about the Cardiac Alliance group of surgeons' trip to the Ukrainian city of Lvov on March 13-19.
Novick explained that the trip came unexpectedly and was organized quickly because three of the patients, who were eight, nine and 17 days old, were in critical condition.
"Ukraine asked (for assistance) because of the complex and life-threatening defects among the newborns," he said.
Novick pointed out that he heard only once the sound of exploding bombs during his stay in Lvov. Asked to compare his experience in Ukraine with that of Belgrade, where he worked during the NATO bombings of the then rump Yugoslavia in 1999, he said, "There is no comparison, Belgrade was much worse."
Novick said that despite the current restrictive measures imposed against Russia by the collective West, he will continue operating there and plans to visit the city of Kemerovo later this year.
"I am not sure what problems the sanctions will create, but you know that I would return to Kemerovo," he said.
Cardiac Alliance specialists have been visiting Ukraine and Russia for many years and carry out pediatric cardiac treatment and care projects in different cities.
On February 24, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine after the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk requested help to defend them from intensifying attacks by Ukrainian troops. The Russian Defense Ministry has said the special operation is targeting Ukrainian military infrastructure only and civilians are not in danger. In response, the United States and its allies have imposed comprehensive sanctions against Russia.
