There was an oppressive silence in the dark corridors of the Pokrovsk maternity hospital. “It’s getting harder and harder,” warned director Ivan Tsyganok as he entered his office on Sunday, August 18. “There are rumors that we may have to leave,” midwife Svitlana Pidshenko had said a few days earlier. “Maybe we’ll be evacuated by the end of the month.” The director of the facility on the outskirts of a medium-sized city in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk is not so sure. Here and there, behind doors and in the stairwells, incubators for premature babies and packed medical equipment indicate preparations for departure.

“Maybe we’ll leave in a week,” Tsyganok commented in his deep, warm voice before mentioning the nearby town of Pavlohrad, about 100 kilometers away, as a possible relocation site.

Staff at the maternity hospital in Pokrovsk have no choice but to prepare to leave as the sounds of fighting grow closer. In recent weeks, Russian troops have been steadily advancing on Pokrovsk, a logistics hub they have been trying to capture for months, in one village after another. According to the website DeepState, which is linked to the Ukrainian army, Russian soldiers are now just 10 kilometers from the city center. Bombings are becoming more frequent.

Six months ago, “we were bombed only once or twice a month,” recalls Pidshenko, a 53-year-old midwife who has worked at the maternity hospital for 33 years. “Then it happened once or twice a week. Now it’s several times a day.”

“Within enemy range”

While the Ukrainian army hoped to ease Russian pressure on the Donbass front by launching an offensive in Russia’s Kursk region on August 6, Moscow’s forces still seemed determined to continue their conquest of Donetsk region. Despite Kyiv’s new front on the northeastern border, their enemy continues to advance into Ukrainian territory. In recent days, local authorities have repeatedly raised the alarm. Then, on Monday, August 19, the oblast’s governor, Vadym Filashkin, ordered the evacuation of families with children living in and around Pokrovsk.

“When our cities are within reach of virtually all enemy weapons, the decision to evacuate is necessary and inevitable,” he said on social media, pointing out that 53,000 residents still live there, including 4,000 children (compared to over 60,000 before the war). They have “a week or two, no more,” he told Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian-language service when asked about the time frame for the evacuation.

On Sunday, the day before the announcement, the town’s population seemed in no hurry to leave. Apart from a few drivers with overloaded trunks and roofs, Pokrovsk appeared calm despite the distant artillery fire. Many shops remained open and flower beds were still being tended. In this region of Donbass, where war has raged for nearly a decade, the maternity hospital continues to operate. “At the moment, we are working as long as there are births,” explains Nadiya Uhnivenko, a 42-year-old midwife. “People don’t stop having children, whether there is war or epidemic.”

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