Loop began operating in Poland in March this year, with the aim of supporting people affected by the Ukraine crisis. The intention is an accessible service both for refugees from Ukraine, and for Ukrainians staying in their own country, as well for those supporting them.
Up to the end of July we had received over 70 individual stories, but many of them represented the needs of multiple people, including families, groups of people, and communities.
The large majority of stories have been from women between the ages of 18 and 59.
All stories have been from Ukrainians and have been shared in Ukrainian or Russian, over Facebook messenger, WhatsApp and on our web platform.
What have people have spoken about has changed over time:
We received primarily sensitive stories and requests for support – trafficking, medical assistance to a bunker in a combat zone, and others.
Questions about visas and the ability to move back and forth across the border to Poland.
All of the questions are about the cash assistance process.
A substantial rise in numbers of stories saying ‘thanks’ for support received.
Overall there has been a very strong engagement from community members offering advice. Patterns of information on Loop mirror those seen in Ukrainian on Facebook and Telegram.
Unlike in other countries, one 5th of all stories received have been sensitive stories.
It is notable too, that all the sensitive stories received are about more than one person – representing a family or up to as many as 60 people.
Assistance such as housing and medical support has been offered to all closed cases so far.
Alex Ross, founder and Managing Director of Loop, believes that the Talk To Loop platform presents organisations wanting to support people with a powerful opportunity to ensure accountability is built-in to their service. She commented:
Loop currently remains free to use and is available for any accountable organisation or group to advocate and invite people to feedback on their services: to offer a safe accessible reporting mechanism. We are asking all organisations, local, national and international, to become accountability champions by using Loop and spreading the word about it.
