Vermont Business & Hospital Team Up to Send Medical Supplies to Ukraine

A donation partnership between a central Vermont business and a hospital means urgently-needed medical supplies are on their way to war-torn Ukraine.

Gifford Medical Center in Randolph donated surgical gloves, hospital gowns, IV bags, bandages, and more — a small contribution to the massive needs of humanitarian aid agencies in Ukraine.

“Even though we’re sending a gift to people that we’re never going to meet, we know that that gift is going to make an impact,” said Ashley Lincoln of Gifford Medical Center. “Those medical supplies are so badly needed right now.”

Gifford Medical Center answered the call from one of its neighbors, an engineering firm called Applied Research Associates, which was looking to check off much-needed items from this list to be donated to Ukraine. ARA said the hospital’s access to large boxes of bulk medical supplies was vital to its collection drive.

Applied Research Associates employees also donated a variety of goods from the list, said the company’s Ryan Langlois, including backpacks for displaced Ukrainians.

“Just to think, these folks did nothing to have to go and endure this,” Langlois said of innocent victims in Ukraine of Russia’s war. “And having to leave their homes under the bombardment of missiles and shelling is just awful to see.”

Meest, an international aid logistics provider, is shipping the business’s and hospital’s donated items to Ukraine.

This is just the latest in a wave of gestures from Vermont, whose leaders recently worked across political aisles to budget a dollar per Vermonter for the group Save the Children. Taken with proceeds from the sale of Russian-made liquors in the state before those were cut off during the invasion, the state’s contribution totaled more than $640,000.

“We will continue to do what we can to help,” Gov. Phil Scott, R-Vermont, pledged at a vigil on the steps of the Vermont State House last week, surrounded by state leaders from across the political spectrum.

Rostyk Yarovyk, a student at Middlebury College from western Ukraine, said he is grateful for all the many New Englanders who have shown deep compassion and even donated to help his homeland.

Yarovyk took part in a panel discussion Monday with other students from Ukraine moderated by Lt. Gov. Molly Gray, D-Vermont. 

“The only thing you can do in this situation is not stop talking about the war,” Yarovyk said in the discussion, which is available to watch online here. "Thank you Vermont and thank you Vermonters for supporting us and for sharing and feeling our pain and for hearing our voices, too."

As for the business and the hospital that teamed up for this project, they said they plan to make future donations to Ukraine, as well.

"That’s the spirit of being a Vermonter," said Lincoln. "We want to help—we want to make a difference."

Applied Research Associates said it would also facilitate donations from other Vermont businesses and individuals.