Morning Jolt: In the ‘World’s Largest Minefield,’ Demand for Prosthetics Is High

WITH JIM GERAGHTY

February 28 2025

In the 'World's Largest Minefield,' Demand for Prosthetics Is High

On the menu today: Today's newsletter will be a little abbreviated, as a long and exhausting trip nears its close.

‘I Have to Learn Again How to Walk’Kyiv, Ukraine — One of the three clinics of the Protez Foundation is just a bit off Euromaidan Square. Another is in western Ukraine, and the third is in Minneapolis, Minn. The foundation provides high-quality free prosthetics and therapy for Ukrainian veterans who have lost a limb. Veterans see and participate in the whole process of designing, building, and refining an artificial limb to enhance the sense that it is theirs, an extension of themselves.

Michael Vakhtomin, operations director for the foundation, explains that it is run entirely on private donations — no government funding from Ukraine or the U.S. government. So far, the organization has provided 750 prosthetics for about that same number of veterans and civilians; some patients require more than one.

-->