Recovery in Ukraine, one life at a time
Across Ukraine, people are rebuilding their lives in classrooms, maternity wards, hospital corridors and local communities despite the ongoing war, according to UN News. On 1 August 2026, the United Nations (UN) highlighted recovery efforts supported by its agencies and the European Union in frontline regions including Kharkiv, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kryvyi Rih. The story documents how education, healthcare, employment and rehabilitation projects are helping communities move forward. UN agencies UNOPS, UNESCO, UNFPA, ILO, UN Women, UNDP and WHO are all involved. The thesis is clear: recovery in Ukraine is unfolding one life at a time.
In the frontline village of Bezruky in the Kharkiv region, half an hour’s drive from the Russian border, the local school took a direct hit early in the war and shut its doors. Tanks rolled past close enough to hear. Rebuilt windows and a reinforced structure brought it back, and the basement became a shelter, then a gallery. More than 15,000 children in the region are back in classrooms because of the project, run by UNOPS with European Union funding. Teacher Yurii Tkalenko, with 20 years in Cherkasy region classrooms, joined a 2025 training programme built around the New Ukrainian School reform, run by UNESCO and funded by the Global Partnership for Education with Ukraine’s education ministry.
For Anastasiia, from the Donetsk region, having a baby meant leaving home for a protected maternity ward in Kharkiv, where she gave birth to twin boys. UNFPA, working with the EU, backs maternity units like hers across the frontline. The ILO’s Nanny School has trained 80 women to care for children aged nought to three, with nearly half finding jobs soon after certifying. In Kryvyi Rih, Oksana now drives one of the city’s longest bus routes after training through UN Women’s She Drives project. She had previously worked as a cargo clerk and doubted she would even pass selection.
In Zaporizhzhia, hospital director Hanna Makarenkova has treated blast injuries and received evacuees from Mariupol, more than 25,000 patients since the full-scale invasion began. “My colleagues give me the strength to keep working,” she says. “Their tireless work, their dedication to the cause, is what motivates me.” New independent power units, funded by the EU and installed by UNDP, now keep her equipment running when the grid fails. In Kostiantynivka, Oleksandr lost both legs and an eye in a drone strike, while his wife Nataliia has spent three months at his side through surgery and relearning with a physical therapist named Illia.
WHO, funded by the EU, has trained more than 300 rehabilitation specialists across Ukraine to fit and adjust wheelchairs, nine of whom are now training others in turn. “I think everything will be alright for us. We’ll live and enjoy life. Because life goes on,” Nataliia says. The initiatives span education, maternal health, employment, energy resilience and rehabilitation. Each is anchored in partnerships between UN agencies, the European Union and Ukrainian institutions. None of this undoes what the war has taken, but it is what rebuilding looks like up close.