Health and internal displacement/forced migration
Websites/Multiple Documents
Description:
Mission Statement: "The Back Pack Health Worker Team (BPHWT) is an independent, nonprofit, multi-ethnic organization
dedicated to providing primary health care to ethnic groups and vulnerable populations in armed
conflict and rural areas of Burma, where access to healthcare is otherwise unavailable. Furthermore,
by equipping communities with the skills and knowledge necessary to manage their own health issues,
the Back Pack Health Worker Team is dedicated to the long-term, sustainable development of a
healthy society in Burma.
To accomplish its mission, BPHWT utilizes mobile health teams to provide a range of primary medical
care, maternal and child health services, and community health education and prevention programs
to internally displaced and vulnerable populations in Burma."..... Emergency Assistance Team;
Services;
Reports and Publications;
About Us;
Partners;
Contact Us;
Links...
How to Help:
Volunteer;
Wish List;
Donations
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Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team (BPHWT)
Date of entry/update:
2010-11-01
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, Internal displacement/forced migration: specialist organisations and resources
Language:
English
more
Description:
Annual and mid-term reports from 2002; 10-year report (1998-2009); special reports; proposals (2010, 2011) survey (2011)
Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team ( BPHWT)
Date of entry/update:
2011-09-05
Grouping:
Websites/Multiple Documents
Category:
Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration
Language:
English, Burmese, Thai
Format :
pdf
Size:
2.8 MB
Local URL:
BPHWT10yearReport_1998-2009.pdf-red.pdf
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Individual Documents
Sub-title:
Tokyo Should Cut Military Ties, Pressure Junta to End Atrocities
Description:
"(Tokyo) – A Myanmar air force lieutenant colonel who received military training in Japan is deployed with forces that have been implicated in serious abuses in Myanmar’s central Magway Region, Human Rights Watch and Justice For Myanmar said today. The Japanese government should immediately halt its training program and investigate whether other program participants are involved in operations involving laws-of-war violations.
Myanmar Air Force Lt. Col. Hlwan Moe received training at Japan’s Air Command and Staff College from August 2016 to March 2017, according to the All Japan Defense Association and a defense ministry document. A media outlet reported that Hlwan Moe is a deputy commander, and two well-connected sources said he is based at Magway Air Base. Heavy fighting in the Magway Region since the February 2021 coup, including armed clashes and airstrikes, has displaced over 50,000 civilians. The Myanmar military has committed summary executions, arson, and other abuses, including possible indiscriminate airstrikes in Magway, media have reported.
“The Myanmar military’s long history of committing war crimes with impunity should have been enough evidence for Japan that its military training program was going to risk making Japan complicit in atrocities,” said Teppei Kasai, Asia program officer at Human Rights Watch. “The Japanese government should give up its absurd, wishful thinking that its training program can change the Myanmar military’s abusive culture.”
Hlwan Moe’s name, rank, position, and military ID 2321 are identified in a list of Myanmar air force personnel reportedly involved in airstrikes since 2021 that was leaked to Khit Thit Media, a Myanmar media group that published it in January 2022. Two sources with connections to Myanmar military personnel, who reviewed Hlwan Moe’s photograph, confirmed his name, military ID and rank.
Since 2015, the Japanese government has accepted cadets and officers from Myanmar under article 100 of the Self-Defense Forces Act, which permits training and educating foreign nationals in Defense Ministry facilities with the defense minister’s approval. In 2021, following the coup, Japan accepted two cadets and two officers. In 2022, Japan again accepted two cadets and two officers for training.
Human Rights Watch in December 2021 called on the Japanese government to immediately suspend the training program because it risks making Japan complicit in military atrocities. At the time, a Japanese Defense Ministry official replied that the ministry did not have any information about what the cadets and officers trained in Japan were doing once back in Myanmar.
During a parliamentary committee session on security on April 26, 2022, however, a Defense Ministry official said the defense ministry “knows to a certain extent” what “positions” they currently hold, but declined to disclose any details due to Japan’s “relationship” with “the other country.” For decades, the Myanmar military has been responsible for war crimes in long-running armed conflicts with ethnic armed groups, and crimes against humanity and acts of genocide against ethnic Rohingya in Rakhine State.
Since the February 2021 coup, junta security forces have carried out serious abuses including mass killings, torture, arbitrary arrests, and indiscriminate attacks on civilians that amount to crimes against humanity and war crimes. The security forces have killed over 1,800 people, including at least 130 children, and arbitrarily arrested over 13,000, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners. The military has expanded abusive operations in ethnic minority areas and against anti-junta armed groups, displacing more than 550,000 people, while deliberately blocking aid to populations in need as a form of collective punishment.
The military has carried out targeted and indiscriminate attacks on civilians, including airstrikes and heavy artillery barrages, causing loss of life and property. Accounts from displaced people and aid workers suggest that the junta has continued to use the military’s longstanding “four cuts” strategy, in which the armed forces maintain control of an area by isolating and terrorizing the civilian population. The United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, in his February report on government weapons sales to the Myanmar military, said that jet aircraft, attack helicopters, armored vehicles, light and heavy artillery, missiles, and rockets were being used against civilians.
Since the coup, the Japanese government has called for a restoration of democratic rule and the release of elected government officials, including Aung San Suu Kyi. On March 28, 2021, Japan’s Defense Ministry issued a joint statement with 11 other countries criticizing the military’s attacks against “unarmed civilians.” The Japanese government halted new non-humanitarian Official Development Assistance (ODA) projects earlier in 2021 while allowing existing aid projects to continue. The Japanese Diet passed a resolution in June that condemned the coup and called for a “swift restoration of the democratic political system.”
“It is inexcusable for Japan to continue to train cadets from the Myanmar military, knowing that it commits atrocity crimes,” said Yadanar Maung, spokesperson for Justice For Myanmar. “Japan’s cadet training program emboldens the junta and provides support to military personnel that may be used in the commission of crimes against the people of Myanmar. We call on the Japanese government to immediately halt these trainings and take concrete steps to stop the Myanmar military from committing grave violations, including ending business with the Myanmar military and its conglomerates.”..."
Source/publisher:
"Human Rights Watch" (USA)
Date of publication:
2022-05-22
Date of entry/update:
2022-05-22
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
2021 Burma/Myanmar coup d'état, Human Rights Watch Reports on Burma/Myanmar, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, Politics and Government - global and regional - general studies, strategies, theory
Language:
more
Description:
Executive Summary: "This report reveals that the health of populations in conflict-affected areas of eastern Burma, particularly women and children, is amongst the worst in the world, a result of official disinvestment in health, protracted conflict and the abuse of civilians..."Diagnosis: Critical" demonstrates that a vast area of
eastern Burma remains in a chronic health
emergency, a continuing legacy of longstanding
official disinvestment in health, coupled with
protracted civil war and the abuse of civilians. This
has left ethnic rural populations in the east with
41.2% of children under five acutely malnourished.
60.0% of deaths in children under the age of 5 are
from preventable and treatable diseases, including
acute respiratory infection, malaria, and diarrhea.
These losses of life would be even greater if it were
not for local community-based health organizations,
which provide the only available preventive and
curative care in these conflict-affected areas.
The report summarizes the results of a large scale
population-based health and human rights survey
which covered 21 townships and 5,754 households
in conflict-affected zones of eastern Burma. The
survey was jointly conducted by the Burma Medical
Association, National Health and Education
Committee, Back Pack Health Worker Team and
ethnic health organizations serving the Karen,
Karenni, Mon, Shan, and Palaung communities.
These areas have been burdened by decades of civil
conflict and attendant human rights abuses against
the indigenous populations.
Eastern Burma demographics are characterized by
high birth rates, high death rates and the significant
absence of men under the age of 45, patterns more
comparable to recent war zones such as Sierra
Leone than to Burma?s national demographics.
Health indicators for these communities, particularly
for women and children, are worse than Burma?s
official national figures, which are already amongst
the worst in the world. Child mortality rates are
nearly twice as high in eastern Burma and the
maternal mortality ratio is triple the official national
figure.
While violence is endemic in these conflict zones,
direct losses of life from violence account for only
2.3% of deaths. The indirect health impacts of the
conflict are much graver, with preventable losses
of life accounting for 59.1% of all deaths and malaria
alone accounting for 24.7%. At the time of the
survey, one in 14 women was infected with Pf
malaria, amongst the highest rates of infection in
the world. This reality casts serious doubts over
official claims of progress towards reaching the
country?s Millennium Development Goals related to the health of women, children, and infectious
diseases, particularly malaria.
The survey findings also reveal widespread human
rights abuses against ethnic civilians. Among
surveyed households, 30.6% had experienced
human rights violations in the prior year, including
forced labor, forced displacement, and the
destruction and seizure of food. The frequency and
pattern with which these abuses occur against
indigenous peoples provide further evidence of the
need for a Commission of Inquiry into Crimes
against Humanity. The upcoming election will do
little to alleviate the situation, as the military forces
responsible for these abuses will continue to
operate outside civilian control according to the
new constitution.
The findings also indicate that these abuses are
linked to adverse population-level health outcomes,
particularly for the most vulnerable members of
the community—mothers and children. Survey
results reveal that members of households who
suffer from human rights violations have worse
health outcomes, as summarized in the table above.
Children in households that were internally
displaced in the prior year were 3.3 times more
likely to suffer from moderate or severe acute
malnutrition. The odds of dying before age one was
increased 2.5 times among infants from households
in which at least one person was forced to provide
labor.
The ongoing widespread human rights abuses
committed against ethnic civilians and the blockade
of international humanitarian access to rural
conflict-affected areas of eastern Burma by the
ruling State Peace and Development Council (SPDC),
mean that premature death and disability,
particularly as a result of treatable and preventable
diseases like malaria, diarrhea, and respiratory
infections, will continue.
This will not only further devastate the health of
communities of eastern Burma but also poses a
direct health security threat to Burma?s neighbors,
especially Thailand, where the highest rates of
malaria occur on the Burma border. Multi-drug
resistant malaria, extensively drug-resistant
tuberculosis and other infectious diseases are
growing concerns. The spread of malaria resistant
to artemisinin, the most important anti-malarial
drug, would be a regional and global disaster.
In the absence of state-supported health
infrastructure, local community-based organizations
are working to improve access to health services in
their own communities. These programs currently
have a target population of over 376,000 people in
eastern Burma and in 2009 treated nearly 40,000
cases of malaria and have vastly increased access
to key maternal and child health interventions.
However, they continue to be constrained by a lack
of resources and ongoing human rights abuses by
the Burmese military regime against civilians. In
order to fully address the urgent health needs of
eastern Burma, the underlying abuses fueling the
health crisis need to end."
Source/publisher:
The Burma Medical Association, National Health and Education Committee, Back Pack Health Worker Team
Date of publication:
2010-10-19
Date of entry/update:
2011-09-05
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Conflict and health, including violations of humanitarian and human rights standards as threats to health, Armed conflict in Burma - Impact on village life, including health and education, Internal displacement/forced migration of Karen villagers, Food Security in Burma/Myanmar - web searches, specialised groups, reports and statistics, Food Security and human rights in Burma, Right to Health: reports of violations in Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma
Language:
Burmese, English, Thai
Format :
pdf
Size:
5.32 MB
Local URL:
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Description:
Preface: "Ten years ago, health workers from the Mon, Karen, and Karenni States in Burma came together
as the Back Pack Health Worker Team (BPHWT) in partnership with the Mae Tao Clinic
in Mae Sot, Thailand. The need for mobile healthcare services grew out of increasing military
attacks against civilians in eastern Burma in the late 1990s, coupled with a lack of local, official
healthcare. These circumstances prevented a large proportion of the population from
receiving basic primary and preventative healthcare services. Since 1998, BPHWT has stayed
true to its founding mission: to equip internally displaced persons with enough knowledge
and skills that they are able to address the health problems of their own communities and
work towards the development of a sustainable health infrastructure.
The Back Pack Health Worker Team established key principles that have guided our work
since the inception of the organization: to provide healthcare services to all, regardless of
ethnic group, age, gender, religion, or political affiliation; to focus on communities where
access to primary and preventive healthcare services is severely limited; to collaborate with
local organizations and communities; to improve health through a multi-sectorial development
and integration approach; and, to foster inter-ethnic unity and trust, thereby promoting democracy in Burma. Over the
past ten years, BPHWT has expanded from 32 teams serving 64,000 people in the eastern border region of Burma to 80 teams
serving over 187,000 people in eastern and western Burma.
Over time, the scope of BPHWT?s services and programs has expanded as well. BPHWT has trained more than 1,300 multi-ethnic
health workers who are currently living and working in their communities in Burma, providing primary and preventive healthcare
services and enabling communities to address and prevent health problems. As BPHWT has grown, so has our reputation,
and we have gained support and assistance from an expanding base of local and international health and education professionals
and donors.
As BPHWT looks towards the next ten years, we will continue to focus on strengthening and expanding our community-based
primary healthcare system in Burma. Whether the future brings continued conflict or peace and democracy. BPHWT remains
committed to our community-based approach, aimed at empowering local populations and bringing ethnic groups together
in the name of improving health for all."
Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team
Date of publication:
2011-01-00
Date of entry/update:
2011-09-05
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration
Language:
English
Format :
pdf
Size:
2.8 MB
Local URL:
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Description:
1) Executive Summary
Over sixty years of civil war in Burma have resulted in the displacement of hundreds of
thousands of people. These people have fled their homes, been obliged to go into hiding for their
own safety and have faced forced relocation. Compounding the loss of homes and security is a
lack of basic human rights, including the right to health. People living along the country?s
borders as well as inside ethnic nationalities? areas have been severely affected.
The Back Pack Health Worker Team (BPHWT) has been providing primary
health care for over ten years in the conflict and rural areas of Burma, where access to healthcare
is otherwise unavailable. The BPHWT provides a range of medical care, community health
education and prevention, and maternal and
child healthcare services to internally
displaced persons (IDPs) and other vulnerable
community members in Burma.
Doctors and health workers from Karen,
Karenni, and Mon States established the
BPHWT in 1998. The organization initially
included 32 teams, comprising 120 health
workers. Over the years and in response to
increasing demand, the number of teams has gradually increased. In 2010, the BPHWT included
81 teams, with each team being comprised of 3 to 5 health workers. BPHWT teams now target
displaced and vulnerable communities with no other access to healthcare in Karen, Karenni,
Mon, Arakan, Kachin, and Shan States, and the Tenasserim Division. The teams deliver a range
of health care programs to a target population of 180,000 IDPs and other vulnerable people. The
BPHWT aims to equip people with the skills and knowledge necessary to manage and address
their own health problems, while working towards long-term sustainable development with
respect to community healthcare.
In 2010, the BPHWT continued to work with communities in its target areas to
implement its three health programs, namely Medical Care Program, Mother and Child
Healthcare Program and Community Health Education and Prevention Program. Three new
Back Pack teams were created in Kachin, Shan-Kayah and Palaung areas to serve communities
with no other access to healthcare. BPHWT also worked in collaboration with Burma Medical
Association, National Health and Education Committee and ethnic health organizations serving
the Karen, Karenni, Mon, Shan and Palaung communities to plan, design and implement a health
and human rights survey in eastern Burma; the results of this survey were published in October
2010 in the report entitled Diagnosis: Critical - Health and Human Rights in Eastern Burma.
Displaced Mother with a Child 2010
4
The BPHWT?s Ten Years Report 1998-2009, detailing the BPHWT?s programs and
organizational development from 1998 through 2009, was also published in 2010.
The BPHWT continued to conduct its regular monitoring and evaluation activities
throughout 2010. In addition, BPHWT workers were given technical support by the Global
Health Access Program (GHAP) to
implement an Impact Assessment Survey so
as to evaluate the outcomes of the BPHWT?s
three health programs in target communities.
The results of this survey will be published in
2011. At the March 2010 Donors? Meeting, it
was decided that an external evaluation would
be conducted, in order to assess the BPHWT?s
programs and management structure. A
consultant was recruited and is currently conducting consultations with target communities,
partner organizations and BPHWT medics, staff and Leading Group. The results of this
evaluation will be published in 2011.
After the November 2010 elections in Burma, increased armed conflict and conflictrelated
abuses in areas of Karen State opposite Thailand?s Kanchanaburi, Tak and Mae Hong
Song Provinces drove large displacement of populations, both inside Karen State and into
Thailand. On the Thai side of the border, the pattern of civilian influxes evolved. The first large
battles in November led to larger influxes of Burmese civilians openly fleeing into Thailand,
where they were provided with temporary shelter in sites recognised by Thai authorities. But by
the end of December, Thai authorities had shut down the last of the temporary shelter sites and
the community network, under the overall coordination of the Mae Tao Clinic, was supporting a
total of 9852 newly-displaced people - comprised of 2039 households with 7867 men and 3779
women. Out of these 9852 displaced people, there were 5212 children under five years of age
among the newly-displaced people in hiding sites along the Thai-Burma border areas.
Since the escalations in armed conflict and displacement in the aftermath of Burma?s
elections, the Back Pack Health Worker Team has worked with the network of community
organizations providing assistance to civilians displaced by ongoing conflict and human rights
abuses along the Thai-Burma border. Inside Karen State, eight teams of Back Pack Health
Workers were deployed to provide health services to civilians affected by the increases in
conflict and conflict-related abuses. The BPHWT also set up a number of borderline mobile Out-
Patient Department (OPD) clinics, to provide health care and assistance to displaced civilians
hiding along the Thai-Burma border. Each borderline mobile OPD clinic was staffed by three to
five experienced BPHWT medics and supplied with the medicines and equipment needed for the
Displaced Mother and Children
5
provision of healthcare to the displaced civilians. On the Thai side of the border, BPHWT has
worked as part of the community based Emergency Relief Team (ERT) providing assistance to
thousands of newly displaced civilians in unofficial or hiding sites. BPHWT health workers
worked with the Mae Tao Clinic and Burma Medical Association as part of the health team,
providing medical assistance to civilians in hiding along the Thai-Burma border, particularly to
those more vulnerable such as pregnant women, children and the elderly
Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team ( BPHWT)
Date of publication:
2011-06-10
Date of entry/update:
2011-09-05
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration
Language:
English
Format :
pdf
Size:
1.8 MB
Local URL:
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Description:
"Armed conflict in Burma?s Karen, Shan and Kachin States continues to fuel large‐scale
displacement of civilians both internally and into neighbouring countries. Between 5,000 and
7,000 civilians remain in temporary, unofficial sites along the Thai‐Burma border in Thailand?s
Tak Province; approximately 20,000 remain internally‐displaced in Kachin State along the border
with China; and thousands have been forced to flee their homes in Shan State due to ongoing
armed conflict. Community‐based groups continue in their efforts to provide assistance to these
populations, who have no access to international protection mechanisms, and little or no
assistance from international humanitarian organisations. The shortage of funding to such
community‐based aid networks is a serious cause for concern, particularly with a high likelihood
of further fighting resulting in more displacement. There is an urgent need for protection
mechanisms and humanitarian assistance for civilians fleeing conflict and human rights abuses in
Burma..."
Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team
Date of publication:
2011-08-31
Date of entry/update:
2011-09-05
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, Armed conflict in Kachin State - hostilities
Language:
English
more
Description:
This link leads to a document containing the Table of Contents of the report, with links to the English, Burmese and Thai versions...
Executive Summary: "Disinvestment in health, coupled with widespread poverty, corruption, and the dearth of skilled personnel have resulted in the collapse of Burma?s health system. Today, Burma?s health indicators by official figures are among the worst in the region. However, information collected by the Back Pack Health Workers Team (BPHWT) on the eastern frontiers of the country, facing decades of civil war and widespread human rights abuses, indicate a far greater public health catastrophe in areas where official figures are not collected.
In these eastern areas of Burma, standard public health indicators such as population pyramids, infant mortality rates, child mortality rates, and maternal mortality ratios more closely resemble other countries facing widespread humanitarian disasters, such as Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Niger, Angola, and Cambodia shortly after the ouster of the Khmer Rouge. The most common cause of death continues to be malaria, with over 12% of the population at any given time infected with Plasmodium falciparum, the most dangerous form of malaria. One out of every twelve women in this area may lose her life around the time of childbirth, deaths that are largely preventable. Malnutrition is unacceptably common, with over 15% of children at any time with evidence of at least mild malnutrition, rates far higher than their counterparts who have fled to refugee camps in Thailand. Knowledge of sanitation and safe drinking water use remains low.
Human rights violations are very common in this population. Within the year prior, almost a third of households had suffered from forced labor, almost 10% forced displacement, and a quarter had had their food confiscated or destroyed. Approximately one out of every fifty households had suffered violence at the hands of soldiers, and one out of 140 households had a member injured by a landmine within the prior year alone. There also appear to be some regional variations in the patterns of human rights abuses. Internally displaced persons (IDPs) living in areas most solidly controlled by the SPDC and its allies, such as Karenni State and Pa?an District, faced more forced labor while those living in more contested areas, such as Nyaunglebin and Toungoo Districts, faced more forced relocation. Most other areas fall in between these two extremes. However, such patterns should be interpreted with caution, given that the BPHW survey was not designed to or powered to reliably detect these differences.
Using epidemiologic tools, several human rights abuses were found to be closely tied to adverse health outcomes. Families forced to flee within the preceding twelve months were 2.4 times more likely to have a child (under age 5) die than those who had not been forcibly displaced. Households forced to flee also were 3.1 times as likely to have malnourished children compared to those in more stable situations.
Food destruction and theft were also very closely tied to several adverse health consequences. Families which had suffered this abuse in the preceding twelve months were almost 50% more likely to suffer a death in the household. These households also were 4.6 times as likely to have a member suffer from a landmine injury, and 1.7 times as likely to have an adult member suffer from malaria, both likely tied to the need to forage in the jungle. Children of these households were 4.4 times as likely to suffer from malnutrition compared to households whose food supply had not been compromised.
For the most common abuse, forced labor, families that had suffered from this within the past year were 60% more likely to have a member suffer from diarrhea (within the two weeks prior to the survey), and more than twice as likely to have a member suffer from night blindness (a measure of vitamin A deficiency and thus malnutrition) compared to families free from this abuse.
Not only are many abuses linked statistically from field observations to adverse health consequences, they are yet another obstacle to accessing health care services already out of reach for the majority of IDP populations in the eastern conflict zones of Burma. This is especially clear with women?s reproductive health: forced displacement within the past year was associated with a 6.1 fold lower use of contraception. Given the high fertility rate of this population and the high prevalence of conditions such as malaria and malnutrition, the lack of access often is fatal, as reflected by the high maternal mortality ratio—as many as one in 12 women will die from pregnancy-related complications.
This report is the first to measure basic public health indicators and quantify the extent of human rights abuses at the population level amongst IDP communities living in the eastern conflict zones of Burma. These results indicate that the poor health status of these IDP communities is intricately and inexorably linked to the human rights context in which health outcomes are observed. Without addressing factors which drive ill health and excess morbidity and mortality in these populations, such as widespread human rights abuses and inability to access healthcare services, a long-term, sustainable improvement in the public health of these areas cannot occur..."
Source/publisher:
Back Pack Health Worker Team
Date of publication:
2006-09-07
Date of entry/update:
2010-12-06
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Conflict and health, including violations of humanitarian and human rights standards as threats to health, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, General studies and surveys on health in Burma, Right to Health: reports of violations in Burma, Burma: Internal displacement/forced migration of several ethnic groups., Backpack medics and other health projects in Eastern Burma
Language:
English, Burmese, Thai
Format :
pdf pdf pdf pdf pdf html
Size:
1.84 MB 890.97 KB 2.21 MB 1.38 MB 1.55 MB 9.35 KB
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Description:
"Villagers in SPDC-controlled parts of Tenasserim Division, including 60 villages forced to move to government relocation sites in 1996, continue to face abuses including movement restrictions, forced labour and arbitrary demands for ?taxation? and other payments. In response, thousands of villagers continue to evade SPDC control in upland jungle areas. These villagers report that they are pursued by Burma Army patrols, which shoot them on sight, plant landmines and destroy paddy fields and food stores. This report primarily draws on information from September 2009. Because KHRG has not released a field report on the region since 2001, this report also includes quotes and photographs from research dating back to 2007..."
Source/publisher:
Karen Human Rights Group Field Reports (KHRG #2009-F19)
Date of publication:
2009-10-29
Date of entry/update:
2009-11-11
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Internal displacement/forced migration of Karen villagers, Health and internal displacement/forced migration, Forced relocation of Karen
Language:
English
more
Description:
Background: Case reports of human rights violations have focused on individuals? experiences. Populationbased
quantification of associations between rights indicators and health outcomes is rare and has not been
documented in eastern Burma...
Objective: We describe the association between mortality and morbidity and the household-level experience
of human rights violations among internally displaced persons in eastern Burma...
Methods: Mobile health workers in conflict zones of eastern Burma conducted 1834 retrospective household
surveys in 2004. Workers recorded data on vital events, mid-upper arm circumference of young children,
malaria parasitaemia status of respondents and household experience of various human rights violations
during the previous 12 months...
Results: Under-5 mortality was 218 (95% confidence interval 135 to 301) per 1000 live births. Almost onethird
of households reported forced labour (32.6%). Forced displacement (8.9% of households) was
associated with increased child mortality (odds ratio = 2.80), child malnutrition (odds ratio = 3.22) and
landmine injury (odds ratio = 3.89). Theft or destruction of the food supply (reported by 25.2% of households)
was associated with increased crude mortality (odds ratio = 1.58), malaria parasitaemia (odds ratio = 1.82),
child malnutrition (odds ratio = 1.94) and landmine injury (odds ratio = 4.55). Multiple rights violations
(14.4% of households) increased the risk of child (incidence rate ratio = 2.18) and crude (incidence rate
ratio = 1.75) mortality and the odds of landmine injury (odds ratio = 19.8). Child mortality risk was increased
more than fivefold (incidence rate ratio = 5.23) among families reporting three or more rights violations...
Conclusions: Widespread human rights violations in conflict zones in eastern Burma are associated with
significantly increased morbidity and mortality. Population-level associations can be quantified using
standard epidemiological methods. This approach requires further validation and refinement elsewhere.
Luke C Mullany, Adam K Richards, Catherine I Lee, Voravit Suwanvanichkij, Cynthia Maung, Mahn Mahn, Chris Beyrer, Thomas J Lee
Source/publisher:
J. Epidemiol. Community Health 2007;61;908-914
Date of publication:
2007-09-00
Date of entry/update:
2008-12-21
Grouping:
Individual Documents
Category:
Conflict and health, including violations of humanitarian and human rights standards as threats to health, Health and internal displacement/forced migration
Language:
English
Format :
pdf
Size:
370.21 KB
Local URL:
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