Emergency

At the height of the COVID-19 outbreak in Nova Scotia, hundreds of free rapid antigen test kits arrived at Homebridge Youth Society, enabling the youth residential care provider to implement twice-weekly testing that helped keep the home in operation through the worst of the pandemic.

In East Africa, tens of millions of people are in dire need of food as a series of disasters from climate change, conflict, the COVID-19 pandemic, a locust invasion, and longstanding vulnerabilities have converged into a humanitarian crisis. Time is running out to avert starvation. Unless urgent action is taken, the continued drought in East Africa could come to resemble the one in 2011, which killed about 260,000 people in Somalia.

For many people who have left Ukraine since the end of February, helping others is a priority, both those who have also fled and those in their new communities. These are the stories of some women from Ukraine who are now supporting the work of the Romanian Red Cross.

Millions of people are being impacted by the conflict in Ukraine - these impacts are also being felt by people thousands of kilometres away. For some countries already facing food insecurity, the interruption to the food supply chain will be devastating.

The Gara de Nord train station in Bucharest is a busy place; it’s Romania’s main rail connection point with the rest of Europe. Since the escalation of the crisis in Ukraine, thousands of people fleeing the conflict have passed through this station. The Romanian Red Cross with its partners runs a quiet refuge in the midst of the bustle, a place for women and children to wait for connecting trains or other travel onward.

In times of humanitarian crisis, finding accurate details and facts can be challenging in a sea of information. Both misinformation and disinformation can put our Red Cross staff, volunteers, and the people we seek to help at risk. Here’s how the Red Cross is helping on the ground in Ukraine and surrounding region.

It has now been almost two months since I packed my bags and headed to Europe to support the Red Cross response to the conflict in Ukraine. I can’t help but think of the millions of people who have also had to leave their homes, under very different circumstances, unsure of what they will eventually return to. The word “millions” doesn’t do these people justice. They aren’t just some anonymous number.

Here are some amazing examples of how people across Canada have been moved to help in creative ways, using their interests and passions to raise money to help those affected by the conflict in Ukraine.