WUNRN
Pakistan: Displacement Traumatic for Pregnant Women
By Ashfaq Yusufzai
PESHAWAR, July 9, 2009 (IPS) - Pregnant women uprooted by the violence
in the Malakand region, northwest Pakistan, have suffered acutely in refugee
camps for the internally displaced.
Displaced women from Swat, Buner and Dir - the three affected districts - have
critical health needs that relief operations must urgently address, says UNFPA,
the United Nations Population Fund.
According to its estimates, some 69,000 pregnant women have been displaced
since the start of military operations on Apr. 27 in the three adjoining
districts of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP).
There were nearly 6,000 new births in June, of which at least 900 required
surgery because of complications, the U.N. agency reports.
Peshawar-based gynecologist, Prof. Anjum Wakeel, who has helped establish
clinics for women in the IDP camps, says everywhere the new mothers and their
infants are facing severe health and nutritional problems because of the
overall poor food, sanitation and medical conditions.
The Pakistan Pediatrics Association (PPA) has set up a special 20-bed ward for
newborn babies in Mardan and Swabi district hospitals, especially for IDPs. But
this is like a drop in the ocean.
Yet the PPA-run wards had admitted 6,075 patients in June. According to the
records, 1,391 were admitted for diarrhoea, 288 for dysentery, 276 Urinary
Tract Infections (UTI) and 122 for meningitis.
"Our doctors had examined about 191 newborn children of whom 144 were
underweight and 125 severely malnourished," says Dr Abdul Hameed, PPA
president. There is severe overcrowding, he confirms. Two or three children can
be admitted on each bed. Neither are there labour rooms to handle
delivery-related complications, he adds.
"The situation could slip out of control if immediate measures regarding
strengthening of childcare in the camps aren't initiated," he told IPS.
UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief
Coordinator, John Holmes, who is on a visit to Pakistan, is reported saying,
"We still need to do more to help (internally displaced) people both now
and in the coming months." Holmes who has visited refugees in camps in
Peshawar, Mardan and Swabi, has traveled to Buner district, Thursday.
Antonio Guterres, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, has described the
massive displacement of Pakistani civilians because of the escalating fighting
between Pakistani forces and Taliban militants as "the most challenging
protection crisis since Rwanda [in the mid-1990s]."
"My son has severe diarrhoea. There is no improvement. He is pale, and not
responding to breastfeeding," Jamala Bibi of Buner in the Shah Mansoor
camp, Swabi, told this reporter on May 20.
Pakistan has a population of 160.9 million, which is growing at a rate of 1.8
percent. According to observers, the country is unlikely to meet goal 4 and 5
of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which calls for reducing child
mortality and improving maternal health respectively, by 15 to 50 percent by
2015.
Every family in the Malakand region has at least five or more children. The
conservative Islamic groups allied to the Taliban, who made Dir, Swat and Buner
their stronghold two years ago, targeted non governmental organisations (NGOs)
working with the community on reproductive health goals. Their field workers
were kidnapped and the NGOs threatened with dire consequences if they did not
pull out of these districts.
A worried Ajmal Khan, 40, is unable to express his feelings over the birth of a
daughter - his sixth child - at the Jalozai camp, near Peshawar, on Jul. 3. The
camp, which had sheltered Afghan refugees till last year, was opened for
Pakistani IDPs. "Under normal circumstances I would have been happy. But
not this time, because my daughter is very sick," he says.
His wife, just 25 years old, had screamed in pain all night till the baby was
born, he adds. In the end, an elderly traditional birth attendent from a nearby
camp was brought to help her, he says. In the morning she was seen by Prof.
Wakeel, the doctor confirmed to IPS.
Most pregnant women among the IDPs need antenatal care which is not available,
the doctor says.
"We have tasked the Lady Health Workers to compile data about pregnant and
lactating women, and provide them medical assistance, so they could deliver in
normal circumstances and avoid complications," says Zahir Ali Shah, NWFP's
health minister.
Now, the UNFPA has scaled up its support for reproductive health care for the
displaced population, and has launched a 3.9 million dollar global appeal to
provide comprehensive maternal, neonatal and child health care and psychosocial
support, both in camps and nearby medical facilities, in 2009. According to
officials,
Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, UNFPA's executive director, told IPS in May that the
agency was working with partners to provide life-saving services to pregnant
women, and psychosocial support and basic hygiene facilities for displaced
families. "We are basing our help on the specific needs of women and
families, with a focus on safeguarding human dignity," he said.
Shah, the provincial health minister promised his government was assessing the
reproductive health needs of IDPs, and apart from establishing health services
in the camps, nearby hospitals would also be provided with the means to support
the needs of displaced women.
================================================================
To contact the list administrator, or to leave the list, send an email to:
wunrn_listserve-request@lists.wunrn.com. Thank you.