Vladik is 8 years old and all of his life he has been struggling and fighting for survival. He lives in Kharkiv, Ukraine - not in a war zone, luckily, but very close to it.

Later on the day of his birth, 12.09.2009, he was taken to the intensive care unit with obstruction in his intestine and had 20 cm of his intestine removed. He lived with a colostomy bag for 7 months.

It was just the beginning of his struggles - he was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis. It means - inhalings, medications, massages, excersises - DAILY. Then he had his Mantoux test (tuberculosis) and fainted. He was showing no reaction to the stimulants whatsoever. There was very little hope that he would survive when he was taken (yet again!) to intensive care unit. After that he had a long rehabilitation period. He was lucky to be alive.

At the age of four, when most children are curiously discovering the big world around them, he had an acute episode of his cystic fibrosis - he started coughing. He was coughing non-stop day and night and nothing seems to work. Drips and drugs failed. At the morning his lung bursted in two places and all the air escaped under his skin. His body immediately ballooned. This time he was taken straight to the theater an had a tracheostomy. After two weeks in intensive care unit he survived. However, this time he was not allowed neither walk, nor laugh, nor shout - he could only sit... or lie down. It was a torture for a boisterous child of four years old.

He survived, nonetheless, and gained some strength. He started home schooling when he was 7 - his regular daily treatment sessions did not allow him to attend classes. Almost immediately he was ill again - doctors found diabetes, hypertension in lungs, heart issues. It seemed he had no chance to live. They have also discovered an infection of Pseudomonas aeruginosa (an opportunistic human pathogen that causes chronic infections in patients with cystic fibrosis and is the leading cause of death by Gram-negative bacteria), which was destroying his lungs.

During a few long months the doctors were struggling to kill the murderous infection to no avail - the child was slowly dying. Again. Nobody knew how to get rid of it - unfortunately, in Ukraine the knowledge of cystic fibrosis is very limited. There are no specialists, neither drugs available.

The family took Vladik to Moscow, where, after a thorough check up in a private clinic,