Posts tagged floods
After a recent typhoon caused severe, and in some cases fatal, flooding on the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) team began providing emergency medical assistance to people whose houses were destroyed and who are now living in evacuation centers.
Photo: Philippines 2011 © Pauline Busson/MSF
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.
Standing there, you could see a partially submerged school and mosque, along with the other buildings in the village. It was complete devastation.
Dr. James Kambaki, MSF project coordinator, on the scene in Pakistan after massive floods hit
Karachi, Pakistan has one of Asia’s largest slum populations. Fifty percent of the city’s inhabitants live in cramped, unhygienic conditions with poor access to water and medical care. Such conditions are a breeding ground for the spread of infectious diseases that are otherwise easily preventable.
Urban Survivors is a multimedia project by Doctors Without Borders/ Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in collaboration with the NOOR photo agency and Darjeeling Productions, highlighting the critical humanitarian and medical needs that exist in slums the world over.
Photo: © Alixandra Fazzina/NOOR
The floods that first struck Pakistan in July 2010 devastated villages and communities across the country. Some 100,000 people fled to Karachi, the country’s largest and richest city, though one with an already enormous slum population. The people who arrived in Karachi between July and October 2010 received help from community-based organisations and authorities who responded quickly to the floods. However, after October, little assistance was available to people who were trying to survive. Those sorely in need of basic necessities like clean water and medicine were left largely to fend for themselves.
Urban Survivors is a multimedia project by Doctors Without Borders/ Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in collaboration with the NOOR photo agency and Darjeeling Productions, highlighting the critical humanitarian and medical needs that exist in slums the world over.
Photo: © Alixandra Fazzina/NOOR
Foreign Aid | The 'Useful Victims' of Pakistan's Flood
“When aid is used for political objectives, or is perceived as such, it can no longer be considered humanitarian….The rhetoric of political justification of aid must be rejected as it sacrifices the needs of those who are not seen as politically “useful.” And, as humanitarians, we must do our utmost to remain independent from political or military agendas in order to maintain the ability to reach those most in need, be they “useful victims” or not.”
A powerful article on the politicization of humanitarian aid by Christopher Stokes, MSF General Director.
(Source: ichaseelephants)
Unfortunately, during the floods, many organizations that say they are impartial and independent humanitarian actors were not resilient enough in maintaining their independence from the military and government. Some used military flights to deliver aid; many accepted armed escorts in places MSF managed to work without them; and others succumbed to ‘guidance’ from the authorities on where aid should be distributed. As a result, hard-won trust in humanitarian organizations like MSF, who are trying to work impartially and independently in the most unstable areas of Pakistan, may now be endangered. This loss of trust may ultimately jeopardize our ability to provide assistance to populations trapped in one of the most volatile and neglected regions in the world.
(Source: afpak.foreignpolicy.com)
Although regrettable, it may not be surprising (nor is it new) that politicians would find aiding victims of a disaster ‘useful’ for winning ‘hearts and minds’ in a strategic region. But aid organizations professing to be humanitarian, should categorically reject this.
(Source: afpak.foreignpolicy.com)
When aid is used for political objectives, or is perceived as such, it can no longer be considered humanitarian.
(Source: afpak.foreignpolicy.com)
Winning the trust of all parties in a conflict and gaining access to the affected population depends on being understood as purely humanitarian — that is, not taking sides but delivering aid based on need alone regardless of political or other influences.
(Source: afpak.foreignpolicy.com)
The rhetoric of political justification of aid must be rejected as it sacrifices the needs of those who are not seen as politically ‘useful.’ And, as humanitarians, we must do our utmost to remain independent from political or military agendas in order to maintain the ability to reach those most in need, be they ‘useful victims’ or not.
Christopher Stokes, MSF General Director, writes in Foreign Policy Magazine’s AfPak Channel blog about how the politicization of aid during the response to Pakistan’s floods threatens the ability of independent humanitarian aid workers to assist populations in the most volatile areas of the country.
Pakistan: Summary of MSF's Flood Response
In Sindh and Balochistan provinces, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) teams continue to assist displaced people with not only immediate needs such as health care and clean water but also transitional shelters until their situation is stabilized.
How MSF is Using Your Donations in Pakistan
Since the beginning of the floods, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has:
- Conducted 56,991 consultations through 5 hospitals, 7 mobile clinics and 6 Diarrhea Treatment Centers
- Treated more than 3,634 malnourished children
- Distributed 1,250,400 liters of clean water per day and built 714 latrines
- Distributed a total of 58,270 relief item kits and 14,538 tents
Read the Article.
When children are severely malnourished, they cannot resist the infections and diseases most likely to claim their lives. If not treated in time, the damage malnutrition leaves on their physical and mental state is irreversible.
Ahmed Mukhtar, an MSF medical coordinator.
Pakistan: Treating Child Malnutrition in Balochistan
“Treating malnutrition in children under the age of five is essential. This improves their chance at survival while their immune system is still developing.”
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Doctors Without Borders/ Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is an international medical humanitarian organization working in more than 60 countries to assist people whose survival is threatened by violence, neglect, or catastrophe. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
