KALADAN NEWS
Dated:
Diarrhoea spreads in Rohingya
refugee camps in
Cox’s Bazar,
April 8: The spread of diarrhoea diseases in
this season, which started in early March, has marked an unusual rise across
the Rohingya Arakanese refugee
camps in
At least two percent of total
populations of undocumented in makeshift camp of Teknaf
are suffering of diarrhea, while some of them are suffering of blood and scanty
mucus dysentery and malaria disease, said Moulana
Mohammed Ayub an Imam of the camp.
Since of March, refugees in the
camps are in deteriorated position for their health as they are deprived of
their refugee rights, which the refugees enjoy elsewhere in the world, he
further added.
Besides, refugees, in two
official camps of Kutupalong and Nayapara
have also unusually spread out the same diseases, but they get little facility
of treatment from camps’ clinic, Ministry of Health (MoH),
which is not enough for them. Resultantly, they would take alternative
treatment from out side of the camps’ dispensaries or local doctors or quake
doctors for their safety survival said Dr. Jalil, an
owner of dispensary from Kutupalong refugee Bazar.
Most of the sufferers are
children and old people, as they have less attention in changing of weather in
season. Meanwhile, malaria diseases also spread out in all around the camps, it
makes refugees more vulnerable, he further said.
According to an undocumented
refugee from Teknaf makeshift camp, “We are in
subhuman condition from all sectors. We cannot go out from our huts due to
restriction of local goons. If we can manage to go out paying some money, we
cannot get treatment from governmental clinics or others. They refuse to give
us health facilities, saying Burmese. Burmese government also expelled us from
home, saying Bengali or Bangladeshi. In this connection, we become stateless.
So, we need help from
According to a report of the
Daily Star on April 6, 2005 that over 16,000 cases of the diarrhoeal
patients in 15 districts were recorded by 5th of April in Bangladesh
while the day before, the total number of patients who were reported to have
suffered diarrhoeal attacks and sought treatment in
17 districts was 17,654.
Bangladeshi experts said,
“Scarcity of water while has an impact on personal hygiene, ingestion of larger
quantities of water that which be contaminated with germs, and quick decaying
of prepared food are among other factors behind the rise on diarrhoeal
attacks.”
Some refugee leaders have
predicted that the member of dirrhoeal patients in
the coming few weeks will substantially rise.
According to a report of Medicine
Sans Frontiers (MSF), an NGO worked in refugee camp in 2002, “Diarrhoea and skin diseases regularly battle for a close
second to Respiratory Tract Infection (RTI), most commonly as a result of
unhygienic surroundings and habits, and untreated water”.
Skin diseases, such as scabies,
and diarrhoea have been in MSF’s
top five causes of overall morbidity since 1992. But neither the high incidence of
water-related diseases, nor the claims of the refugees themselves convinced the
responsible actors that the refugees were suffering from a lack of water,
report mentioned.
There were more than 250,000 Rohingya fled their home in 1991-92. Vast majority of them
were reportedly forced back to
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