Darfur, after months of bombings, assaults and roundups, the humanitarian situation is disastrous: villages besieged and razed to the ground

ROMA – According to the latest estimates, 34% of those internally displaced in Sudan due to the war that broke out in April 2023 are Darfur residents who fled the region for safety. In Nyala, the capital of South Darfur, EMERGENCY continues to guarantee drugs and vaccinations against diseases such as tuberculosis and tetanus. It also continues to organize health education sessions to promote the right practices for managing breastfeeding, hygiene, nutrition in the stages of malnutrition and to prevent diarrhoea, cholera and malaria.

Staff work in the field. Since last May, over 15,000 women, mothers of children, have been reached with whom a relationship has been established to promote healthy behaviors for maternal and child health. Over 3,000 children were vaccinated, say the women and men of the staff who work in Sudan for the organization founded by Gino Strada. “People are struggling with famine and diseases that would be easily preventable elsewhere, but which in a collapsed health system can have extreme consequences.”

A healthcare system destroyed by war. In Khartoum, an average of 110 children arrive at the EMERGENCY clinic every day. Over 60% code yellow or red. Due to the war, the local healthcare system is increasingly weak and insufficient, hunger is increasingly extreme, the level of infections is increasingly acute: compared to two months ago, the number of patients arriving has more than doubled. The conditions in which they arrive are increasingly critical.

The shocks caused by malnutrition. Cases of shock caused by acute forms of malnutrition are increasing,” says our nurse Caterina. “There is a lack of food, even nutritional centers are struggling to find doses of therapeutic food. And supplies often fail to reach their destination: another consequence of the fighting. We also treat many gastroenteritis, caused by contaminated food and stagnant water. Bacteria are proliferating everywhere.”