Soldiers in war-torn Ukraine are being urged to freeze their sperm as the country grapples with a population crisis. A state-funded programme has been launched to allow those fighting Russian troops on the frontlines to store their sperm free of charge, giving their partners the option of having children even if they die in combat or have their ferility impacted by prolonged stress or injury. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said 55,000 soldiers had been killed on the battlefield between February 2022 and 2026, leaving the country in the grips of a demographic disaster.

Its overall population has dropped from 42 million to below 36 million since Russia’s invasion, including several million in areas captured by Moscow, according to Ukraine’s National Academy of Sciences. The organisation estimates that the figure will plummet further to around 25 million by 2051 – forcing officials to take desperate measures to ensure enough citizens are left to rebuild the devastated country.

Maxim, a 35-year-old National Guard soldier, who was deployed near the eastern frontline, said he was persuaded by his wife to freeze his sperm during a recent period of leave in Kyiv.

He told the BBC: “Our men are dying. The Ukrainian gene pool is dying. This is about the survival of our nation.

“Whether you are right on the ‘zero point’ of the frontline, or 30 or even 80 kilometres back, there is no guarantee that you’re safe.

“That means stress, and this [can have] an impact: your reproductive ability declines. So we have to think about the future and the future of our Ukrainian nation.”

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The Ukrainian government stepped in to offer free sperm freezing to soldiers in 2023, months after private fertility clinics began offering servicemen so-called cryopreservation following Russia’s invasion.

The law holds that all soldiers’ samples should be preserved for free for up to three years after their deaths and can be used by a partner with prior written consent.

MP Oksana Dmitrieva described the measure as just “one tiny step” towards improving Ukraine’s demographic situation.

“Our soldiers are defending our future, but may lose their own, so we wanted to give them that chance,” she said.

“We’re also thinking about the future and all the young people we’ve lost. We need to replace them.”