Around the world, millions of refugees and migrants in vulnerable situations, such as low-skilled migrant workers, face poorer health outcomes than their host communities, especially where living and working conditions are sub-standard, according to the first WHO World report on the health of refugees and migrants. This has dire consequences for the probability that the […]
Read More… from WHO report on vulnerable refugees and migrants
Migrants and refugees say COVID-19 has dramatically worsened their lives: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a highly negative impact on the living and working conditions of refugees and migrants reveals a new WHO study, launched on International Migrants Day. More than 30,000 refugees and migrants from different regions around the world participated in the first ever […]
Read More… from Migrants and refugees say COVID-19 has dramatically worsened their lives
Dr Halim Boubaker, MSF medical coordinator for Northwest Syria reports Ten-fold increase in coronavirus cases adds new challenges in northwest Syria Northwest Syria is currently witnessing a sharp increase in the number of patients with COVID-19, which is now ten times higher than what it was just a month ago. As of 22 September, 640 people had tested […]
OHCHR, IOM, UNHCR and WHO joint press release: the rights and health of refugees, migrants and stateless must be protected in COVID-19 response. In the face of the COVID-19 crisis, we are all vulnerable. The virus has shown that it does not discriminate – but many refugees, those forcibly displaced, the stateless and migrants are at heightened risk. Three-quarters of the world’s refugees and […]
Mike Thomson is a doctor from the UK, currently working in Irbid, Jordan, at a Medecins Sans Frontieres project which focuses on refugee health for those with chronic illnesses. Here he blogs about taking up a new role, as the mental health lead for the project. ‘Mental health provision was not part of the original […]
“Doctors are not border patrol,” Dr Paquita de Zulueta stresses, “nor are we the Home Office.” Such distinctions – no matter how forceful – do not always put refugees in the UK at ease when they need healthcare. Refugees often do not access treatment because they fear being reported. Sometimes, they are denied primary healthcare because […]
As a public health physician who has previously worked with Medicins Sans Frontieres in Sierra Leone and Turkey, I’ve just finished an assignment setting up an emergency community health surveillance system in Palorinya refugee settlement, northern Uganda. Approximately 147,000 South Sudanese refugees have settled in Palorinya over the last few months, fleeing conflict and violence. […]
Conor Kenny is a doctor who has recently returned from Greece. He began his assignment working at Idomeni, a transit camp for refugees on the Greek border with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. After residents of the Idomeni camp were evicted, Conor moved to Lesbos to work providing healthcare in specialised camps designated for […]
Read More… from A lost generation – working with young refugees in Greece
Aaminah Verity is a volunteer doctor who works with the international healthcare charity, Doctors of the World (Médecins du Monde). She recently spent six weeks on the Greek island of Chios, working in the charity’s mobile clinic, aka the “Medibus”, and also spent time at a static clinic situated in one of the main refugee […]
Conflict and emergencies can disrupt HIV services; however, the prevalence of HIV infection is generally low among people from the Middle East and North Africa. Hence, there is a low risk that HIV will be brought to Europe by migrants from these countries. Despite a decline during the past decade, migrants still constitute 35 per […]