When conflict erupted in Ukraine in 2022, millions of neighbors lost everything — their homes, their livelihoods, their lives as they knew them. While the world watched in shock, you took immediate action. Your generosity created a ripple effect of hope and recovery across war-torn areas, proving that your compassion knows no boundaries.
More than three years on, your love is still hard at work caring for families who continue to cope with the turmoil of war.
In 2024, you reached 122,276 Ukrainian neighbors. Here’s how:
Making health care accessible for the hardest-to-reach
Grigorii Kapusta receives an eye exam near his home in Sumy Oblast, which shares a border with Russia. Medical care has been extremely limited in Grigorii’s community since the start of the war.
Health care in conflict zones is always scarce, and often nonexistent. But because of compassionate people like you, mobile clinics staffed with skilled medical teams continue to bring much-needed care to hardest hit communities, offering:
- Specialized care teams including cardiologists, gynecologists, psychologists, family doctors, and laboratory technicians.
- Integrated support to ensure women and girls who experienced violence had access to immediate and confidential care and support.
- Diagnostics and mental health support in communities with a critical shortage of health services.
Your compassion doesn’t just deliver medical care to those most in need. It provides hope for families facing unimaginable challenges.
I think it’s very good to have these mobile teams because not everyone can afford or has time [to travel for medical care]. It’s also a big relief on the local doctor's burden, because there's only one doctor. He can't help everyone. — Patient Tetiana Mykhailivinia, who visited the mobile clinic for a cardiogram.
Restoring income for long term recovery
Alina Katlyarova displays the cheese she produces on her family farm.
Imagine losing not just your home, but also the means to provide for your family. That was the harsh reality for farmers like Alina Katlyarova in Kharkiv Oblast, one of the first regions affected by the war. Her dairy farm has been in her family for generations but was nearly lost when production came to a halt during seven months of Russian occupation.
Your generosity has provided thousands of farmers like Alina with funds to help restart farm production. Alina’s family used the support to invest in new machinery that has helped triple their output of artisanal cheeses. Thank you for helping hardworking farming families. Because of you, they’ve received :
- Agricultural supplies, including seeds, fertilizers, farming tools, and chicken coops.
- Specialized training to improve production and sustain their crops through winter.
- Financial support in the form of micro-business grants to expand or establish small agricultural enterprises. Through these initiatives, you are bolstering the resilience of farming communities to the conflict's economic fallout.
It has always been our dream. Using this equipment I can increase production three times. These results are incredible. This is really great for our family. [Lutheran World Relief] is wonderful for helping us to achieve this. — Alina’s mother Oksana, a dairy farmer and cheesemaker. When the war started, their farm’s milk production went down, and they had to sell some of their cattle to survive.
Providing Warmth During Harsh Winters
Yurij Butrin with his wood burning stove, provided by your love.
Winters in Ukraine can be brutal, but they’re even harsher when your home has no heat. Because of you, thousands of our neighbors like Yurij Butrin were touched by warmth and hope of your love. Living mere miles from the Russian border, Yurij and his wife had no gas or electricity during the winter months, meaning no heat for warmth or cooking. Compassionate people like you changed that. More than 95,000 Ukrainians received critical supplies to make it through the harsh cold season, including:
- 31,140 Personal Care Kits
- 60,465 LWR Quilts
- 450 wood stoves
Each quilt you provided, every stove delivered, and every kit shared meant a family could face the winter with dignity and comfort. You wrapped them in care and safety when they needed it most, bringing light to their darkest days.
When it was cold during the winter, there was nothing, and then the stove was delivered. We felt someone took care of us. The stove helped us make it through the winter. — Yurij Butrin
Helping women and girls recover from trauma
Thanks to caring people like you, Alina Kravchenko and her daughters have begun healing from the trauma inflicted by the war.
War amplifies risks for women and girls. Your kindness helped create places where neighbors like Alina Kravchenko and her two daughters Olexandra and Sofia can find healing and strength following the violence and trauma of war.
When Alina’s husband was sent to the frontlines, she and her children were left behind and her village was overtaken. They were trapped due to the constant shelling and when they finally managed to flee, both daughters stopped speaking because of all they had witnessed.
Since moving into a women's center made possible by your generosity, Alina and her girls are starting to reclaim their lives through mental health support and art therapy classes. In 2024, you’ve helped nearly 15,000 neighbors like Alina. Thank you for:
- Establishing women and children-friendly spaces that offer mental health support, individual and group therapy and legal assistance.
- Providing women with skills and resources such as educational sessions and training to rebuild their confidence and lives.
- Improving community capacity to prevent violence against women through specialized training for local medical staff, community leaders, youth, school personnel and social workers.
We are all living here with our neighbors as one big family, helping each other ... We share our pain and empathize with each other. [LWR] has psychologists at the center too, they help us to relieve ourselves and support us psycho-emotionally. — Alina Kravchenko
Every story is written by your love
Many daycares and schools have closed because of the war, but since she moved with her mother and sister to an LWR-supported women’s center, Olexandra Kravchenko attends a child learning center twice weekly.
Every life saved, every family whose livelihood has been restored, and every neighbor relieved from the traumatic burden of war, is thanks to your compassion hearts. Your love has written every story. Your kindness transcends borders and improves the lives of thousands of our Ukrainian neighbors, a testament to the incredible impact of collective compassion.
Thank you for your steadfast generosity to our neighbors who need it the most.
Until we reach every neighbor.
