That part of the story made me wonder why the cataracts haven't been treated. There are relatively low-risk and well-understood treatments for cataracts that do a very good job restoring vision.
Cost? The URSS was already declining by then, and Ukraine was “born poor” in many ways. A procedure might well be safe and effective, but if the local health service can’t afford to do it thousands of times, they will just ignore it.
