Ukraine Help Is 'Important for the Entire World'—Nobel Scientist Paul Nurse

In the more than 540 days since the Russian invasion began, the war in Ukraine has left its mark on all sections of society. These effects have rippled across the globe, affecting energy, food security and scientific progress.

Paul Nurse, a Nobel Prize–winning geneticist, has seen these effects firsthand. "It's such a tragedy, what's happening there," he told Newsweek.

"I was in Kyiv just at the beginning of the intensification of the Russian attacks," he said. "What was perhaps the most memorable thing for me was visiting some of the areas in the vicinity of Kyiv that had been occupied by the Russian Army very early on in the invasion, where there is very considerable destruction of infrastructure, including schools. And I found it really very moving."

Nurse visited a school in Buzova village that had been badly bombed in the spring of 2022. "You go into a classroom and you see the desks piled up in the corner under all the rubble, where whiteboards are just shattered and where computers have been smashed to bits, where the children's artwork is just scattered all over the floor.... It's a terrible juxtaposition of normal school life and the barbarism of war."

Speaking to the schoolchildren and their teachers, Nurse was struck by their strength and resilience. "They almost made me weep with how they are coping," he said. "But even though they are resilient, when the kids are being exposed to the barbarism of war, it's going to mark them, possibly scar them for the rest of their lives."

As of May 29, over 1,888 educational institutions have been bombed during the war, 180 of which have been destroyed, according to UNESCO. Over 7.5 million children, 1.5 million youths and 70,000 international students learning in Ukraine have been affected.

Hundreds of schools across Ukraine need restoration, but most of the overseas support has come in the form of military aid. To enable more targeted donations, President Volodymyr Zelensky established United24, a government-led fundraising platform created to "unite the world around supporting Ukraine."

The platform provides donors with a choice of five support streams to determine where their funds are distributed: defense, humanitarian demining, medical aid, rebuilding Ukraine and education and science. Nurse was appointed as an ambassador for the education and science stream and has successfully worked on a project to raise funds to restore the school in Buzova. But there are still hundreds of schools in need of restoration.

Beyond the educational environment, the war has been a great hindrance to the development of global knowledge. "It's affected the Ukrainian scientists because it's really almost impossible for them to do science in Ukraine at the moment," Nurse said. "They simply do not have the resources to be able to do it. So many Ukrainian scientists have gone to other countries to carry out their research."

This has resulted in a "brain drain" from many of Ukraine's academic institutions. "It's very important that this is seen as a temporary thing and that they can return to Ukraine," Nurse said.

By supporting education and academic research, Nurse hopes that we can build for the future of Ukraine and its people.

"Ukraine needs all the help it can get from individuals and from countries like the U.K. and U.S. so that they can weather the storm," he said. "I think that's important for Ukraine, important for Europe and important for the entire world."

Update 08/18/23, 2:30 p.m. ET: This article was updated with a new video.

Update 08/21/23, 12:18 p.m. ET: This article was updated to reflect additional material from UNITED24.