Current Time has visited the intensive-care unit of a COVID-19 hospital in Kyiv, where a recent surge in infections means every single bed is full. Many patients arrive in critical condition and require mechanical ventilation of their lungs.
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, crisis centers throughout Russia are reporting a spike in requests from women for help against domestic violence. Self-isolation and quarantines reportedly contribute to this problem, but, unlike in the past, many women are opting to speak out.
As Russia pursues vigorous "vaccine diplomacy," offering its Sputnik V vaccine to other countries, its own citizens can't get the much-needed shot in the arm.
Current Time reporters asked doctors and medics who have been battling COVID-19 in different countries to share their advice and wishes for others in the new year. They hoped for an end to the pandemic -- and for patience and strength to face new challenges.
Russians have been telling Current Time about their experiences with the new Sputnik-V COVID-19 vaccine after the country began a mass vaccination program. President Vladimir Putin said on December 2 that 2 million doses of the Russian-made vaccine would be made available within days.
Some Russian medical professionals have alleged that various means are being applied to force them to take a Russian-made vaccine against COVID-19 that has not completed mass clinical trials. Russia began a mass rollout of its Sputnik-V vaccine this week.
Valery Melnikov was known in Russia for the huge New Year's cards he created on the ice and snow of a frozen river in the country's Far East. After he died in October at the age of 72 after contracting COVID-19, residents of his home region of Amur decided to continue the tradition he started.
The situation in many Ukrainian hospitals is critical, doctors say, after a spike in the number of coronavirus cases in the country. There's a shortage of beds, intensive-care units are overcrowded, and many seriously ill patients have to wait for ventilators.
The video is shocking: a 90-year-old grandmother with COVID-19 is turned away from a Russian hospital because there are no beds left. As the scale of Russia's health crisis becomes apparent, authorities in one region reacted by banning mobile phones.
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