An Irish charity which sends medical teams to Ukraine has said it is struggling to raise funds for its surgical work there as the focus of the international media turns to other parts of the world.
Chernobyl Children International has funded surgery for more than 4,000 children in Ukraine over the past 20 years.
A team of surgeons, anaesthetists and nurses, drawn from throughout the world, has just returned home after completing a two-week surgical mission in Ukraine.
Chernobyl Children International has been sending surgical teams to Ukraine to operate on babies and children with congenital heart defects since 2004.
It is more than 35 years since one of the reactors exploded at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and the impact of the world's worst nuclear disaster continues to be felt across Ukraine to this day.
Chernobyl Children International said thousands of children are born in Ukraine every year with congenital heart defects.
Before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Chernobyl Children International's surgical teams travelled to Eastern Europe three or four times per year, performing cardiac surgery on dozens of babies and children from a base at a hospital in Kharkiv, in north east Ukraine.
However, following Russia's invasion, those surgical teams moved to the relative safety of western Ukraine, to St Nicholas Hospital in Lviv.
"This is the only hospital in the entire Ukraine that can perform complex heart surgeries, because 900 hospitals have been bombed by the invaders," Chernobyl Children International's voluntary Chief Executive Adi Roche told RTÉ News.
Ms Roche said: "Our hospital is the critical hospital. They come from far and wide with babies and with children because the only hope for their babies' survival are the international teams funded by the people of Ireland."
Over the past fortnight, the latest Chernobyl Children International team to travel to Ukraine performed surgery on around two dozen babies and children.
Sadly, four of those did not survive surgery; the remaining 20 are now in recovery.
Most of the surgeries were complex, lasting more than eight hours.
Among the team, for the first time, was an Irish nurse Karen Kelly.
Ms Kelly, who is from Kildare, is an advanced nurse practitioner in heart failure.
In addition to working with the surgical team in Lviv for the past fortnight, she spent the last year appealing for and gathering surgical and medical supplies which were shipped to Ukraine, arriving at St Nicholas Hospital in Lviv during the week.
"Karen Kelly is an extraordinary woman," Adi Roche said.
She said: "She just showed her skills as a cardiac nurse, but also her humanity, her compassion and her love for these children."
Ms Roche said the war in Ukraine has increased the cost of sending surgical teams there but, as the international media attention turned to the Middle East and Israel's war in Gaza, fundraising for Chernobyl Children International has become more difficult.
"Our world is in turmoil, and there are so many needy causes, particularly Gaza, Sudan and Syria," Adi Roche said.
She said: "At the moment, unfortunately, Chernobyl and Ukraine has slipped down the agenda and that is reflected in this year's Christmas appeal. Unfortunately, I hate to say it, but we are down by 80% at the moment.
"We are already budgeting for next year so, in order for us to continue the life-saving surgeries and the missions, we need to draw in money as soon as possible, in order to continue to carry out these life-saving surgeries."
Ms Roche said Chernobyl Children International's fundraising is now at "a critical point" and it hopes to be able to continue its work in Ukraine for as long as there is a need there.
