Indian medical students face an uncertain future after fleeing war in Ukraine

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• Amna Nawaz:

  More than seven million people have fled Ukraine since the fighting broke out in February, among them, nearly 80,000 foreign students, most from developing nations.

  Although Ukraine is better known as one of the world's top agricultural producers, it's also become a hub for higher education. Indian nationals account for almost a quarter of all foreign students enrolled in Ukraine, most of them studying medicine.

  As Fred de Sam Lazaro reports from New Delhi, they now face an uncertain future.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  It's a special Friday lunch, a traditional Punjabi meal being prepared for a family get-together.

  But the Girdhar family's only daughter, Garima, helping mom in the kitchen shouldn't really be here, relieved though her folks are that she is. Just over three months ago, she was sending home images from Ukraine, where she was in the middle of her third year of medical school, being assured by authorities that there would be no conflict, she says, until just hours before it actually began.

• Garima Girdhar, Medical Student:

  Every two or three hours, there would — there are these sirens. And we have to run them to the bunkers.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  In the bunkers, they planned their escape.

• Garima Girdhar:

  We were all afraid about everything. We — I contacted with my agent. And he booked the bus to Romania. And the bus dropped us 20 kilometers before the border.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  They walk 12.5 miles in frigid temperatures to the Romanian border. But, unlike thousands of fleeing Ukrainians, she says, the Indian students were not allowed to pass.

• Garima Girdhar:

  They said, we will not let you cross. We will allow first our local citizens to cross, and then we will let you cross.

  We have to wait there for, like, one night. And we were on the roads lighting a fire, so we can get some warmth to us.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  The group returned hours later, desperate to try their luck again.

• Garima Girdhar:

  We are, like, pushing, pushing. I just crossed the border. And when I turned, nobody was with me.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  It was several days before she was able to join thousands of other Indian students returning home in an evacuation organized by India's government.

  Ritu Bala, Mother of Garima Girdhar (through translator): I wasn't able to breathe properly until she came back.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  For Garima's mother, Ritu Bala, that relief has gradually given way to worry that three years of medical education they could barely afford could now be wasted.

• Ritu Bala (through translator):

  It's always been her dream. It's been difficult, but we took out bank loans to send her to study. We are worried what will happen in the future.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  In India, it's extremely competitive to get into public medical universities and prohibitively expensive in private ones. The cost of a medical education in Ukraine can be as little as one-third of what it costs here in India.

  Since her unexpected return, Garima has continued to hang onto a semblance of normalcy, as has her school, the Ternopil Medical University, With online instruction.

  Dr. Oksana Drapak is one of Garima's professors in pharmacology.

  Thanks for making the time.

  I spoke briefly to her over a shaky video connection.

• Dr. Oksana Drapak, Ternopil National Medical University:

  Where I live now is the most calm part of Ukraine. But when we hear the signals, the alarm, yes, we should go to the safe place. Usually, it's somewhere on the underground.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  One benefit of the pandemic is, it familiarized teachers and students with working online, she says. Today, amid the war's horrors, Dr. Drapak says it's been a lifeline.

• Dr. Oksana Drapak:

  It takes me out from these horrible things I see and hear everywhere and helps me to keep normal way of life, yes, for some period.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  It keeps you from going crazy just all the time.

  (CROSSTALK)

• Dr. Oksana Drapak:

  Yes. It keeps me going crazy, yes.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  Garima Girdhar is grateful to attend online, something not available from all Ukrainian medical schools. But she worries about missing a critical component of her medical education, clinicals.

• Garima Girdhar:

  When we were practicing in person, we are able to see the patients. We are able to do the clinical practice. But now we cannot do so.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  She hopes that gap could be filled in India.

  And how many people belong to this group?

  Garima is among 6,000 students in a group pulled together on the social messaging app Telegram by Pulkit Pareek, a fourth-year student at Bogomolets National Medical University in Kyiv.

• Pulkit Pareek, Medical Student:

  First, we are approaching the central governments.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  They have been lobbying government officials at federal and state levels to allow them to transfer into Indian med schools.

• Pulkit Pareek:

  The main thing is that because now it's — have been long time, and we don't know when the war will stop.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  India's Supreme Court has ordered the country's National Medical Council to develop plans to accommodate students forced to return from abroad, especially in finding clinical placement.

  It's a heavy lift. Curriculums are structured differently, and there's the sheer number and space. India's 542 medical schools are at their enrollment limit.

  Dr. Srinath Reddy, Public Health Foundation of India: For every 17 students who appeared for the national entrance examination, there's only one medical seat.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  Dr. Srinath Reddy of the Public Health Foundation of India hopes the plight of the Ukraine returnees forces this country to sharply increase the number of doctors it produces.

• Dr. Srinath Reddy:

  In OECD countries, it is 44 per 100,000 medical graduates graduating.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  This is in generally rich countries.

• Dr. Srinath Reddy:

  Rich countries, whereas, in India, it's nine per 100,000.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  And it's sort of ironic, is it not, that India is such a major exporter of medical doctors?

• Dr. Srinath Reddy:

  Unfortunately, that's true.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  One 2017 showed that 69,000 Indian medical school graduates now practice medicine in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Australia, pursuing superior facilities and pay compared to what's available in India when they graduate.

  The question for students like Garima today is, graduate from where and when?

• Garima Girdhar:

  We are going back in September, according to them.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  And according to you?

• Garima Girdhar:

  I don't know. If, for security or maybe other reasons, I don't think it is possible right now to go back.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  For her part, pharmacology Professor Drapak reflects the resolve heard frequently from Ukraine's leaders.

• Dr. Oksana Drapak:

  I have a great belief in our army, which will overcome these problems, yes. And students may come back. And I hope, yes, and, in September, we will see each other.

• Fred de Sam Lazaro:

  Garima Girdhar is due back in September for a critical final exam in Ukraine, which must be taken in person, one that determines if she will move on to the fourth of her six-year course.

  For the "PBS NewsHour," this is Fred de Sam Lazaro in New Delhi.

• Amna Nawaz:

  And a quick note that Fred's reporting is a partnership with the Under-Told Stories Project at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota.