Mortality rates among children reached frightening levels at Doro, Jammam and Yusif Batil refugee camps in Upper Nile during the last few days of June, said the top humanitarian official from SPLM-North.
Hashim Orta, the head of humanitarian affairs in the camps for Blue Nile refugees, told Radio Tamazuj that one of the reasons for the high mortality rate is that camps experienced a massive influx of new refugees without providing sufficient health services. Overcrowding also led to transmission of diseases.
The relief officials’ concerns echo those voiced by Doctors Without Borders on July 6, when the medical agency disclosed that the child mortality rate in Jammam Camp is 2.8 per 10,000 per day – well above the emergency threshold of one death per 10,000 people per day.
Orta added that another reason for the high number of deaths is that most of the children and mothers suffer from fatigue because they crossed the border walking from Blue Nile to Upper Nile. There were inadequate services given to them during their trek to the camps, he said.
See also:
Mothers and children suffer terribly en route to Doro Camp (5 July 2012)
Jamam clinics see 600+ severely malnourished children from Blue Nile (26 June 2012)
Photo by Radio Tamazuj: A woman and child at a medical transit site in Jamam Camp near the MSF-Holland clinic, June 2012