Hospitals in affected areas shut or taken over; critical supply for obstetric care, post-rape treatment, contraceptives disrupted
Of the 11 million people in Sudan who need urgent health assistance, 2.64 million are women and girls of reproductive age. Photo: iStock Continuing attacks on healthcare facilities, equipment and workers in Sudan are depriving women and girls of life-saving healthcare, with pregnant women hardest hit, the World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) flagged in a release June 20, 2023.
The conflict that has claimed nearly 1,000 civilian lives since it started in mid-April has brought new dangers for women and girls with doctors and hospitals overstretched and critical medicine supplies running low.
Around 67 per cent of hospitals in areas affected by fighting are closed, with several maternity hospitals out of action, including Omdurman hospital, the largest referral hospital in Sudan, according to the statement. Doctors, nurses and community midwives are unable to travel because of roadblocks and ongoing fighting.
The fighting between the Sudanese Army Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support was a result of a vicious power struggle within the country’s military leadership. Women are the worst sufferers of this tension between the African country’s military factions.
Of the 11 million people in Sudan who need urgent health assistance, 2.64 million are women and girls of reproductive age. Some 262,880 of them are pregnant and over 90,000 will give birth in the next three months, the UN bodies noted. “All of them need access to critical reproductive health services.”
Since April, WHO has verified 46 attacks on health workers and facilities, which have killed eight people and injured 18 others. Facilities and health assets have been looted and health workers have been subjected to violence.
Also, some of the health facilities are being used by the armed forces. There are reports of a military occupation of the National Medical Supply Funds (NMSF) warehouses in Khartoum, where medicines for the entire country, including malaria medicines, are kept and the national pharmacy for chronic diseases is located. WHO’s stock of emergency medical supplies and development products is kept at its warehouse on the premises.
UNFPA’s stocks of medicines and equipment for obstetric care, post-rape treatment, as well as a wide range of contraceptives, which are stored at warehouses in Khartoum, South Darfur, West Darfur and elsewhere are also inaccessible.
Health facilities in several states, including the Darfurs, have warned that they are facing critical shortages of medical supplies.
WHO April 25, 2023 warned of an extremely dangerous situation as one of the warring groups in Sudan took over the National Public Health Laboratory in Khartoum.
The attack on the lab was extremely detrimental to the healthcare system in Sudan, where the population is facing a heightened risk of diseases like malaria, cholera, dengue as electricity and water supplies are cut and public health response work is interrupted.
The facility in Khartoum is the main public health lab in Sudan containing polio, measles and cholera isolates. Nima Saeed Abid, WHO representative, cautioned of the risk of biological hazard as lack of technicians and powercuts are preventing the proper management of biological materials.
Hospitals are running out of fuel to power generators that provide electricity. Six newborns died at a hospital in the city of Eld’aeen in East Darfur in a week due to lack of oxygen amid electricity blackouts. More than 30 newborns have died at the hospital since the beginning of the fighting, local doctors estimated.
Dr Natalia Kanem, executive director, UNPFA, urged that health facilities, health workers and patients must be protected and humanitarian and medical aid must be allowed through. People who need urgent healthcare should not be afraid to step out of their homes, and women’s right to reproductive healthcare must be upheld, conflict or no conflict, she added.
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