Brent Stirton/Getty Images

I went to Ukraine to work on HIV issues because, at the time, it was experiencing the fastest acceleration of HIV infection in the world. I had very little time on this trip, it’s an expensive place to work and I was covering the worst elements of the HIV crisis in a 14-day sprint across the country. After a whirlwind tour across half Ukraine, a horror show of disease, ignorance and neglect, I came eventually to Donetsk, a bleak industrial ruin of a town.

Industry has collapsed since the fall of communism and the majority of the population live in the abject poverty of prolonged unemployment, men and women living each day under a cloud of impotent fatalism. There is very little possibility of improved circumstances and people know that. They looked at me with a mixture of resignation and contempt, as well as a rare opportunity for cash made manifest.

(more…)

Digg This!   Tweet This!   Share on Facebook   Stumble It!