On Tuesday, February 18, Riga City Council and the Children's Hospital Foundation signed a Memorandum of Cooperation to support the organisation of psychological camps for Ukrainian children again this year.
As already reported, the Memorandum of Cooperation provides for continued work that had already been started last year to support Ukrainian children. The signing was attended by Vilnis Ķirsis, Riga City Council Chairman, Linda Ozola, Riga City Council Vice-Chairwoman, and Liene Dambiņa, Chairwoman of the Board of the Children's Hospital Foundation.
"Our support for Ukraine has been, is and will be unwavering and permanent: the Riga City Council continues its already successful cooperation with the Children's Hospital Foundation, which is able to attract the best professionals to provide psychological support camps for Ukrainian children and young people in Riga so that they can have a break from war. The horrors of war are beyond our comprehension, the least we can do is to support giving children, young people, their parents or guardians the opportunity to rest in Riga as a haven of peace, at least for a while," says Vilnis Ķirsis, Chairman of the Riga City Council.
"For my part, I would like to highlight the cooperation with the Rubizhne Military Administration. Its territory is now effectively in the occupied part of the country, but the local government continues to operate and care for its citizens, both remotely and through in-person services for those who have evacuated from the occupied zone. The Rubizhne administration currently has 207 registered children of soldiers, 14 children of fallen soldiers and eight orphans. Of the 1,351 children registered by the local government, 304 are children included in special categories. Riga's support will make a significant and tangible contribution to this local government's difficult fight against the consequences of the Russian invasion," said Riga Deputy Mayor Linda Ozola.
The Riga City Council, in cooperation with the Children's Hospital Foundation, will allocate EUR 105,000 to support the camps. Three camps will be organised this year. As last year, all camps will be organised in partnership with Okhmatdyt, the largest children's hospital in Ukraine. This year, the camps will host children from Ukraine who have been physically injured or have lost one or both parents as a result of the war. One of the camps is for children registered in the territory of the Rubizhne Military Administration.
Last year, two psychological support camps for Ukrainian children and their carers were organised within the framework of this cooperation. A total of 40 children and 32 mums and dads took part in both camps, as well as six specialists from the Ukrainian Children's Hospital, including a clinical psychologist, a psychologist, a paediatrician and a physiotherapist. The presence of specialists was necessary due to the physical illnesses of the children, but at the same time all the specialists gained knowledge and learned from their Latvian colleagues in order to improve their daily work with the patients.
During each camp, children and their families had access to psychological support from professional and experienced specialists working with children, adolescents and their parents from the Adolescent Resource Centre, as well as sessions with a physiotherapist, visits to the swimming pool and workshops. The children were also offered fun activities to relieve daily stress and improve their emotional state.
The camps were attended by children with various health problems, including circulatory and oncological conditions such as Burkitt’s lymphoma, acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and haemophilia. All the children had psycho-emotional traumas, such as anxiety, sleep disorders, depressive and neurotic states, alongside their physical health problems. Ohmatdyt Children's Hospital treats children from all over Ukraine, and children came to Latvia from different regions, including Kyiv, Volyn, Khmelnitsky, Kirovograd regions, Kherson and Dnipro.
Since 24 February 2022, when the Russia began its full-scale attack on Ukraine, the Riga Municipality has provided continuous and extensive support to Ukraine in its fight against the invaders and continues to provide support to Ukrainian civilians coming to Riga as refugees.
Information was prepared by: Sabīne Solovjeva, Project Coordinator for External Communications Department of Riga City Council Communication Administration, email: sabine.solovjeva@riga.lv.
