PORTLAND, Ore. — A Portland man is back home after spending more than two months in Poland helping send medical supplies to Ukraine.
In the four months since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine, the disaster-recovery nonprofit Americares has sent more than 130 tons of medical supplies to the war-torn country, and those shipments aren’t expected to slow down.
Ever since Portland resident Adam Keehn landed in Poland in early March, he’s been playing a pivotal role in making sure those medical supplies get through to Ukraine.
Keehn is the Director of Complex Emergencies for Americares, leading a team that works to make sure hospitals and medical facilities are able to stay stocked up on supplies like needles, bandages and over-the-counter medicine for patients.
“We provide pain medication, chronic disease medicines for heart disease and also your standard over-the-counter drugs like aspirin,” he said.
Keehn was staying just two hours from the Ukrainian border while in Poland, and he said the hardest part wasn't getting the supplies into Ukraine, but navigating global supply chain disruptions for medicine and medical supplies.
He said he was able to solve the problem by getting creating and working with other countries nearby.
“We were also procuring medicines in Poland and Romania because that can sometimes be more cost-effective when you can get those supplies locally,” he said.
He’s back in Portland at the moment, but Keehn said he’s expecting to return to Poland sometime this year because the need is so high for medicine and medical supplies.
“It was very chaotic, a lot of stress because everyone was doing what they could to try to get supplies into the country,” he said, reflecting on his time in Poland so far.