Posts tagged Somalia

Special Report: Assisting the Somali Population Affected by the Humanitarian Crisis of 2011 Somalia’s humanitarian crisis continues to be one of the worst in the world. This year, Somalis have faced the devastating effects of drought, compounding a long-lasting conflict and the absence of a functioning health care system. Throughout 2011 MSF ran medical projects in up to 22 different locations in south-central Somalia, the epicenter of the crisis, as well as large-scale programs in the Somali refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya. In the period from May to December 2011, MSF treated over 95,000 patients for malnutrition, and treated over 6,000 patients for measles and vaccinated almost 235,000 children against the disease. Within its various health care structures MSF assisted in over 5,500 deliveries and provided over 450,000 consultations. Download the full report here. Photo: A Somali woman waits for food distribution in the Badbadoo refugee camp. Somalia 2011 © Martina Bacigalupo

Special Report: Assisting the Somali Population Affected by the Humanitarian Crisis of 2011

Somalia’s humanitarian crisis continues to be one of the worst in the world. This year, Somalis have faced the devastating effects of drought, compounding a long-lasting conflict and the absence of a functioning health care system.

Throughout 2011 MSF ran medical projects in up to 22 different locations in south-central Somalia, the epicenter of the crisis, as well as large-scale programs in the Somali refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya.

In the period from May to December 2011, MSF treated over 95,000 patients for malnutrition, and treated over 6,000 patients for measles and vaccinated almost 235,000 children against the disease. Within its various health care structures MSF assisted in over 5,500 deliveries and provided over 450,000 consultations.

Download the full report here.

Photo: A Somali woman waits for food distribution in the Badbadoo refugee camp. Somalia 2011 © Martina Bacigalupo

Somalia: MSF Hospital Caught in Center of Fighting in Mogadishu The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders condemns today’s shelling of Daynile Hospital in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. Fighting began in the morning in Daynile, a neighborhood located in an outlying area of Mogadishu. The shelling struck the hospital’s emergency room and a portion of the surgical ward, causing significant damage. MSF has worked in the hospital since 2006.There were no casualties among the hospital’s 19 patients or staff, comprising 36 medical personnel and 12 guards. All patients and staff sought shelter from the shelling in the internal medicine department. MSF calls on parties to the conflict in Somalia to respect the neutrality of Daynile Hospital, along with that of all medical facilities in the country, and to respect the safety of patients and hospital staff.Photo: Somalia 2011 © MSF A building in a refugee camp in downtown Mogadishu, not far from the MSF hospital at Daynile, bears the scars of the conflict.

Somalia: MSF Hospital Caught in Center of Fighting in Mogadishu

The international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders condemns today’s shelling of Daynile Hospital in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu.

Fighting began in the morning in Daynile, a neighborhood located in an outlying area of Mogadishu. The shelling struck the hospital’s emergency room and a portion of the surgical ward, causing significant damage. MSF has worked in the hospital since 2006.

There were no casualties among the hospital’s 19 patients or staff, comprising 36 medical personnel and 12 guards. All patients and staff sought shelter from the shelling in the internal medicine department.

MSF calls on parties to the conflict in Somalia to respect the neutrality of Daynile Hospital, along with that of all medical facilities in the country, and to respect the safety of patients and hospital staff.

Photo: Somalia 2011 © MSF A building in a refugee camp in downtown Mogadishu, not far from the MSF hospital at Daynile, bears the scars of the conflict.

Somali Refugees in Dadaab Struggle On

Though the international spotlight has moved on, hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees in the Dadaab camps in northwestern Kenya, the largest refugee camps in the world, continue to struggle amid harsh conditions and pervasive malnutrition, particularly among children. Aid has been too slow in coming, however, and longer-term solutions are nowhere to be found.

Somalia: Measles Takes its TollMeasles is sweeping unchecked through parts of southern Somalia. The disease is highly contagious and unvaccinated children are at great risk, especially if they are also malnourished. The war in southern Somalia is a key factor contributing to ongoing widespread malnutrition, low vaccination coverage, and lack of access to health care services. All of these factors aggravate the spread and severity of diseases like measles. In some Doctors Without Borders programs, the number of measles cases has sharply increased in recent days and weeks. Many patients arrive in severe condition. “Over the last weeks, we diagnosed and treated over 300 patients for measles—mainly children—in the towns of Haramka and Marere in Lower Juba Valley,” said Silvia Colona, Doctors Without Borders’s project coordinator for southern Somalia. “We also set up a measles treatment unit in the city of Kismayo last week, and it filled up immediately with critically ill children.”Somalia 2011 © Martina Bacigalupo A four-year-old boy suffering from measles and malnutrition waits for his medicine in Banadir hospital in Mogadishu.

Somalia: Measles Takes its Toll

Measles is sweeping unchecked through parts of southern Somalia. The disease is highly contagious and unvaccinated children are at great risk, especially if they are also malnourished. The war in southern Somalia is a key factor contributing to ongoing widespread malnutrition, low vaccination coverage, and lack of access to health care services. All of these factors aggravate the spread and severity of diseases like measles.

In some Doctors Without Borders programs, the number of measles cases has sharply increased in recent days and weeks. Many patients arrive in severe condition.

“Over the last weeks, we diagnosed and treated over 300 patients for measles—mainly children—in the towns of Haramka and Marere in Lower Juba Valley,” said Silvia Colona, Doctors Without Borders’s project coordinator for southern Somalia. “We also set up a measles treatment unit in the city of Kismayo last week, and it filled up immediately with critically ill children.”

Somalia 2011 © Martina Bacigalupo
A four-year-old boy suffering from measles and malnutrition waits for his medicine in Banadir hospital in Mogadishu.

A lot of the people we saw had never seen a doctor. Ever.

Nenna Arnold, who was an outreach nurse supervisor in Dadaab, Kenya from August 2010 – May 2011.

She continued:

“Doctors Without Borders was already running a hospital and four busy health posts inside the crowded Dagahaley refugee camp when hundreds of people fleeing Somalia began to arrive. But there was no room for them in the camp. It was already extremely overcrowded, with 100,000 people living in a space created for 30,000. So the refugees began to settle on the outskirts of the camp. They had no access to food, water, and shelter and built small huts out of twigs, cloth, and cardboard.

The first thing I did was to organize a group of community health workers to find the children and pregnant women who needed medical attention. Every day our vehicle was filled with patients, including many malnourished and sick children. We’d deliver them to one of the health posts or the hospital, depending on the severity of their condition.

At times I felt overwhelmed by the enormity of this growing crisis, but I extended my stay for an extra three months because I felt there was still so much more I could do. I loved the people and our medical action was so critical.”

In the Dadaab camps of northerastern Kenya, which collectively form the largest refugee camp in the world, life is becoming more difficult every day and hundreds of thousands of refugees are facing a humanitarian emergency. Their health is at risk of deteriorating rapidly but humanitarian aid agencies are struggling to provide meaningful assistance on an ongoing basis. Learn more.

Ethiopia: “There Is Still So Much to Improve” In early 2011, there were some 40,000 Somali refugees in Ethiopia. By the end of 2011, that number had more than tripled, to 142,000, following a mass exodus triggered by a terrible drought that killed crops and herds in a country already wracked by 20 years of conflict. The numbers alone, however, do not tell much about the days, or even weeks, Somalis spend walking to reach and cross the border with barely any food or water. It does not reveal the dire malnutrition affecting the children in the camps, nor does it express the effort made by humanitarian agencies to fight hunger and exclusion and reduce emergency levels of child mortality. José Luis Dvorzak, an MSF doctor in Liben, reminds us that there is still much work to be done.You have worked as a doctor at different times in the past two years in the Liben camps. I first arrived in June 2010. There were three international workers and 35 national employees. We carried out nutritional activities in the two camps, in Bokolmayo and Malkadida (40,000 refugees) and the Dolo Ado health center. The second time I arrived in September 2011, the change had been enormous: we had 50 international workers and over 800 national employees. By then, new camps had been opened, Kobe and Hillaweyn, each sheltering 25,000 new refugees that had arrived from Somalia in the worst of conditions, with very high mortality rates. At one point there had been up to 13,000 people admitted in our feeding program. In September, after months conducting a nutritional intervention, we managed to reduce mortality to levels below the emergency threshold.How would you describe the medical situation endured by the population at present? We still have children admitted in our stabilization centers suffering from severe malnutrition complicated with other diseases such as pneumonia or diarrhea—some 45 kids (during the emergency peak this figure rose to over a constant 150) weekly. The most common pathologies amongst the population are respiratory infections, diarrhea, intestinal parasites, and skin diseases. Currently, we are also implementing mental health and epidemiological surveillance programs using community health workers.Read the rest of the interview with José Luis Dvorzak.Photo: Ethiopia 2011 © Michael Tsegaye An MSF staff member uses a feeding tube to treat a malnourished child in Liben’s Hiloweyn camp.

Ethiopia: “There Is Still So Much to Improve”

In early 2011, there were some 40,000 Somali refugees in Ethiopia. By the end of 2011, that number had more than tripled, to 142,000, following a mass exodus triggered by a terrible drought that killed crops and herds in a country already wracked by 20 years of conflict. The numbers alone, however, do not tell much about the days, or even weeks, Somalis spend walking to reach and cross the border with barely any food or water. It does not reveal the dire malnutrition affecting the children in the camps, nor does it express the effort made by humanitarian agencies to fight hunger and exclusion and reduce emergency levels of child mortality. José Luis Dvorzak, an MSF doctor in Liben, reminds us that there is still much work to be done.

You have worked as a doctor at different times in the past two years in the Liben camps.

I first arrived in June 2010. There were three international workers and 35 national employees. We carried out nutritional activities in the two camps, in Bokolmayo and Malkadida (40,000 refugees) and the Dolo Ado health center. The second time I arrived in September 2011, the change had been enormous: we had 50 international workers and over 800 national employees. By then, new camps had been opened, Kobe and Hillaweyn, each sheltering 25,000 new refugees that had arrived from Somalia in the worst of conditions, with very high mortality rates. At one point there had been up to 13,000 people admitted in our feeding program. In September, after months conducting a nutritional intervention, we managed to reduce mortality to levels below the emergency threshold.

How would you describe the medical situation endured by the population at present?

We still have children admitted in our stabilization centers suffering from severe malnutrition complicated with other diseases such as pneumonia or diarrhea—some 45 kids (during the emergency peak this figure rose to over a constant 150) weekly. The most common pathologies amongst the population are respiratory infections, diarrhea, intestinal parasites, and skin diseases. Currently, we are also implementing mental health and epidemiological surveillance programs using community health workers.

Read the rest of the interview with José Luis Dvorzak.

Photo: Ethiopia 2011 © Michael Tsegaye
An MSF staff member uses a feeding tube to treat a malnourished child in Liben’s Hiloweyn camp.

publicradiointernational: Somalia, September 2011. (Photo: Yann Libessart/MSF) Doctors without Borders is one of the few aid groups that works in areas of Somalia controlled by al-Shabab militants. The aid group has just released a new book about the complexities of that sort of work. It’s called: Humanitarian Negotiations Revealed. Duncan Mclean helps manage the group’s work in Somalia. He says that the hospital Doctors Without Borders operates on the outskirts of Mogadishu treats any injured individual, including al-Shabab fighters. “A certain degree of that aid that we’re providing will be used for other ends than what we intended it to be,” Mclean said. “And it would be naïve to consider otherwise, to maintain this idealistic image of aid work.” Full interview with Mclean here.

publicradiointernational:

Somalia, September 2011. (Photo: Yann Libessart/MSF)

Doctors without Borders is one of the few aid groups that works in areas of Somalia controlled by al-Shabab militants. The aid group has just released a new book about the complexities of that sort of work. It’s called: Humanitarian Negotiations Revealed.

Duncan Mclean helps manage the group’s work in Somalia. He says that the hospital Doctors Without Borders operates on the outskirts of Mogadishu treats any injured individual, including al-Shabab fighters.

“A certain degree of that aid that we’re providing will be used for other ends than what we intended it to be,” Mclean said. “And it would be naïve to consider otherwise, to maintain this idealistic image of aid work.”

Full interview with Mclean here.

Somali Survivor Seeks to Give Back

Civil war destroyed Hussein Magale’s home in Somalia in 1992, when he was around two years old. Forced to flee, he spent the next 16 years in a Kenyan refugee camp.

“I was born in Somalia, raised up in Kenya, now I’m switching over to being an American,” he said.

“(People) live in an open prison, far away from justice and humanity,” Magale said. “They speak, but their voices are never heard.”

Doctors Without Borders eventually came to his camp. So Magale, who speaks three languages, began translating for them.“If they (doctors) were not like that, I wouldn’t have survived,” he said. “Working with them … I understood the power of a medical education.”

Now, he’s a biochemistry sophomore and an aspiring doctor. He translates for the University of Arizona Medical Center’s doctors and assists the Arizona Refugee Connection, which helps people worldwide.

He still has a lot of work ahead of him and medical school is some time away, but his goals for the future are very clear. “When I become a doctor,” he said, ”I’m planning to not only help Somalia or Somali refugees, but anyone who needs it most.”

Learn more on the work of Doctors Without Borders with Somali Refugees.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

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SomaliaSomalia: Providing Humanitarian Aid on al-Shabab’s Turf

Listen to an interview with MSF’s Duncan Mclean on PRI’s The World - the topic was the Humanitarian Negotiations Revealed book in the context of Somalia.

Duncan Mclean helps manage the group’s work in Somalia. He says that the hospital Doctors Without Borders operates on the outskirts of Mogadishu treats any injured individual, including al-Shabab fighters.

Photo: Somalia, September 2011. (Photo: Yann Libessart/MSF)

Somalia: “Today the Child is Completely Different Than [the] Day He Was Admitted” Four-year-old Khalif has been under treatment in MSF’s inpatient therapeutic feeding center in the southern Somali town of Kismayo for just over two weeks when his mother, Abshiro Gedi, tells his remarkable story. The family lives in Mayondo village, about 37 miles (60 kilometers) north of Kismayo, in an area that has been heavily affected by the ongoing crisis in Somalia. Two of Khalif’s brothers recently died from complications related to measles, and Khalif and his sister were also suffering from the disease. When one of Abshiro’s brothers, who lives in Kismayo, heard the bad news about his nephews’ deaths and illness, he hurried to Mayando to bring the two remaining sick kids to MSF’s therapeutic feeding center for malnourished children in Kismayo. Once there, Khalif was admitted as he had signs of severe malnutrition. “Today the child is completely different than [the] day he was admitted,” explained Abdirasak Sheikh Abdiwahab, MSF project coordinator assistant in Kismayo’s center for malnourished children. “Cases like this who improve quickly are many, not only Khalif, but this is a [good example of the conditions people face here].” To read the rest of the story and to learn more about MSF’s work in Somalia click here. Photo: Somalia 2011 © Sven Torfinn

Somalia: “Today the Child is Completely Different Than [the] Day He Was Admitted”

Four-year-old Khalif has been under treatment in MSF’s inpatient therapeutic feeding center in the southern Somali town of Kismayo for just over two weeks when his mother, Abshiro Gedi, tells his remarkable story.

The family lives in Mayondo village, about 37 miles (60 kilometers) north of Kismayo, in an area that has been heavily affected by the ongoing crisis in Somalia. Two of Khalif’s brothers recently died from complications related to measles, and Khalif and his sister were also suffering from the disease. When one of Abshiro’s brothers, who lives in Kismayo, heard the bad news about his nephews’ deaths and illness, he hurried to Mayando to bring the two remaining sick kids to MSF’s therapeutic feeding center for malnourished children in Kismayo.

Once there, Khalif was admitted as he had signs of severe malnutrition. “Today the child is completely different than [the] day he was admitted,” explained Abdirasak Sheikh Abdiwahab, MSF project coordinator assistant in Kismayo’s center for malnourished children. “Cases like this who improve quickly are many, not only Khalif, but this is a [good example of the conditions people face here].”

To read the rest of the story and to learn more about MSF’s work in Somalia click here.

Photo: Somalia 2011 © Sven Torfinn

This mother and child—and this part of Mogadishu—show the toll of the overlapping political, security, and public health crises in Somalia, which have put an immense burden on women and children. Years marked by conflict, drought, and a profound lack of governance culminated in a massive humanitarian crisis in the second half of 2011, to which MSF responded by expanding its programs in Somalia and for the huge numbers of Somali refugees who sought aid in Kenya and Ethiopia. Photo: Somalia © Lynsey Addario/VII

This mother and child—and this part of Mogadishu—show the toll of the overlapping political, security, and public health crises in Somalia, which have put an immense burden on women and children.

Years marked by conflict, drought, and a profound lack of governance culminated in a massive humanitarian crisis in the second half of 2011, to which MSF responded by expanding its programs in Somalia and for the huge numbers of Somali refugees who sought aid in Kenya and Ethiopia.

Photo: Somalia © Lynsey Addario/VII

MSF Condemns Attacks On Aid Workers And Calls For Release Of Abducted Colleagues in Somalia

One week ago, a gunman killed Phillipe Havet and Andrias Karel Keiluhuo, two Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) aid workers, while they were implementing emergency assistance projects in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu. Three months ago, MSF staff members Montserrat Serra and Blanca Thiebaut were abducted in the Dadaab refugee camp in northern Kenya while providing emergency assistance for the Somali population there.

These attacks on aid workers must be condemned in the strongest terms, MSF said today. They jeopardize life-saving medical projects that are already far from adequate in addressing the vast medical needs of the Somali population.

MSF is confronting the difficult dilemma of working in a context like Somalia, where the needs are not only extremely great, but the risks are exceptionally high for the safety and security of all staff. As we consider this dilemma, MSF is requesting that all people—especially the authorities in control of areas in Somalia where our kidnapped colleagues are being detained—do everything possible to facilitate the safe release of Blanca and Montserrat.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

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A Doctor Returns to Somaliland

After 20 years outside the country, Dr. Sohur Mire came back to Somaliland to work with Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). Somaliland is a nominally autonomous region of northern Somalia. At 68,000 square miles it’s about the size of England and Wales, or the state of Oklahoma in the US, with a population of around 3.5 million. Decades of war and food shortages have left the area poor and insecure, although it has escaped the worst of recent violence in Somalia to the south. MSF’s history here goes back to the 1980s; today, teams run two hospitals in the towns of Burco and Ceerigabo.

MSF Shocked And Deeply Saddened By The Killing Of Two Staff Members In Mogadishu, Somalia

It is with great sadness that the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) confirms that two of its staff members were killed Thursday morning as a result of a shooting at the MSF compound in Mogadishu, Somalia.

While one of the aid workers died during the shooting, the other was transferred to a hospital and died following surgery Thursday evening. The victims are Belgian and Indonesian nationals.

The exact circumstances of the shooting are not yet clear. MSF’s immediate priority is to take care of those most affected by this tragedy, in particular the families and colleagues of the victims.

MSF will be relocating some staff from Somalia for security reasons but remains committed to continuing its humanitarian work in Mogadishu and elsewhere in Somalia.

In Somalia, Maryan walked ten miles with her malnourished child on her back to get lifesaving emergency care. Two-year-old Deng was brought to a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) hospital in South Sudan where he was treated for kala azar – a deadly tropical disease. Sanna was pregnant when the floods in Pakistan hit and left her without clean water or food. Together, Doctors Without Borders and our donors provided these women and children and many thousands of people like them with the emergency medical care they needed to survive. But as we head into 2012, your support is critical as we prepare to respond to the medical needs of people facing natural disasters, deadly diseases and conflict. Will you help us save more lives in the year to come?

In Somalia, Maryan walked ten miles with her malnourished child on her back to get lifesaving emergency care. Two-year-old Deng was brought to a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) hospital in South Sudan where he was treated for kala azar – a deadly tropical disease. Sanna was pregnant when the floods in Pakistan hit and left her without clean water or food.

Together, Doctors Without Borders and our donors provided these women and children and many thousands of people like them with the emergency medical care they needed to survive. But as we head into 2012, your support is critical as we prepare to respond to the medical needs of people facing natural disasters, deadly diseases and conflict.

Will you help us save more lives in the year to come?