Situation in Darfur and Chad remains critical, warns Oxfam

DESPITE international attention and visits by foreign dignitaries the humanitarian situation in Darfur and eastern Chad remains critical, international aid agency Oxfam warned yesterday.

The onset of the rainy season has contributed to the deterioration of public health, with high rates of malnutrition, bloody diarrhoea, and waterborne diseases such as hepatitis E reported throughout Darfur. The threat of cholera or malaria epidemics is a critical concern, as displaced people continue to arrive at already overcrowded sites with limited water and sanitation facilities.

“The scale of this disaster is immense,” explains Caroline Nursey, Oxfam’s Regional Director, just back from Darfur. “People are still arriving daily at camps throughout Darfur and Chad, straining an already overstretched infrastructure.”

Thousands of people have recently arrived at Kalma, a camp of over 70,000 displaced people in South Darfur. Many of them are desperate and pleading for help.

“I met a group of families from Silia who said they haven’t received any help since coming to Kalma several weeks ago,” says Adrian McIntyre, an Oxfam aid worker in Darfur. “They are drinking contaminated water from the nearby wadi, which is also serving as an open-air toilet for hundreds of people. It is making them sick, but there simply isn’t enough clean water available.”

Insecurity continues to plague the region, with reports of women being regularly subjected to extreme forms of harassment and violence, including beating, abduction and gang rape.

“Time is running out for desperate people in Darfur and Chad. Now is the time to act. The international community has a moral obligation to do everything possible to end this conflict and alleviate the suffering that has resulted from it. As long as hundreds of thousands of people are still hungry, sick, and living in fear, every government in the world is failing the people of Darfur,” said Caroline Nursey, Oxfam’s Regional Director.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation says it is concerned that a cholera outbreak could spread to the Darfur region.

The government of Chad says more than 2,000 cases of cholera have been reported in the country, and it expects that number to more than double by the end of the rainy season in September.

Chad has been battling a potential locust scourge in the west, and has received an influx of refugees in the east from the fighting taking place in the Darfur region.