Injuries from the war in Ukraine have forced the country to develop highly advanced prostheses. Matthew Sparkes looks at what the rest of the world can learn from its efforts I N THE early 1980s, military forces from the Soviet Union went to war in Afghanistan in an effort to prop up a failing Marxist regime. At the time, Ukraine was part of the union, and many of its people were conscripted. Plenty of soldiers ended up losing legs in the fighting – and back then, their options weren’t good. Shockingly, the Soviet authorities’ response was to offer them a medical version of a skateboard to get around. …