Zimbabwe is facing a huge humanitarian crisis. Cholera broke out late last year and cases continue to break out in the capital Harare and across the country. Médecins Sans Frontières medical teams have now treated almost 45,000 people, an estimated 75% of the total number of cases in the current cholera outbreak.
Joanna Stavropoulou has lived in Harare for over a year now. Her work as a Field Communications Officer for Médecins Sans Frontières has taken her to different parts of Zimbabwe, where she spent a substantial amount of time in Bulawayo and Beitbridge. Her daily life and the work with Médecins Sans Frontières in Zimbabwe – ranging from HIV programs to the cholera emergency response – has instilled in her a deep appreciation for the country, its culture, and people. She describes some of her recent experiences in these blog entries.
Hamish Graham is a medical doctor from Bellfield in Victoria. He has just returned from working with Médecins Sans Frontières in Niertiti in Darfur, Sudan. Here, over a period of months, Hamish shares with us the experiences he has had working in this conflict-affected region.
Dr. Khine Myae, a Médecins Sans Frontières physician, was one of the first physicians Médecins Sans Frontières sent to the devastated Irrawaddy Delta to provide assistance after it had been battered by Cyclone Nargis in May 2008.
In this blog, read about what Dr. Khine Myae remembers of the first few days after the tragedy occurred.
Médecins Sans Frontières runs the Congo Emergency Pool in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). With bases in Lubumbashi, Kisangani and Kinshasa, teams can go almost anywhere and they respond to approximately ten medical alerts every month.
In this blog, members from the PUC team send regular reports from the most remote areas of DRC, where they fight outbreaks and provide assistance to victims of violence or of natural disasters.
Médecins Sans Frontières has been providing primary healthcare services to Burmese Rohingya refugees in Teknaf, southeast Bangladesh. It is estimated that over 10,000 of these refugees live in the makeshift Tal camp on a mangrove swamp of no more than 50 metre's wide lying between the river Naf and a busy highway.
Jiann Hughes from the Médecins Sans Frontières Australia office recently visited the camp. Here are her reflections.
Field blogs