Top Ten Lists

More than 400 million people are at risk for the neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) visceral leishmaniasis (kala azar), sleeping sickness, Chagas disease, and Buruli ulcer.

New York, December 21, 2009—Civilians attacked, bombed, and cut off from aid in Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), along with stagnant funding for treating HIV/AIDS and ongoing neglect of other diseases, were among the worst emergencies in 2009, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reported today in its annual list of the "Top Ten" humanitarian crises.

MSF-USA Executive Director Nicolas de Torrente speaks with Mark Leon Goldberg of UN Dispatch about the Top Ten Humanitarian Crises of 2008.

Hear about the worst humanitarian crises of 2008, and whether there’s anything that we as individuals can do to help. Nicolas de Torrente of MSF talks about their recently-released "Top Ten" list of 2008.

Already struggling to survive with little or no access to even basic health-care services, Somalis experienced some of the worst violence in over a decade in 2008, with people in the central and southern parts of the country living under increasingly deteriorating humanitarian conditions.

Every year, tuberculosis (TB) kills about 1.7 million people and 9 million develop active disease. TB is on the rise in countries with high HIV rates, particularly in southern Africa, which has the highest rates of HIV. Tuberculosis is one of the leading causes of death for people living with HIV/AIDS, and in the past 15 years, new TB cases have tripled in countries with high HIV prevalence. People living with HIV/AIDS are up to 50 times more likely to develop active TB in a given year compared with HIV-negative individuals, and roughly a third of the 33 million people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide are infected with latent TB. Yet, in 2006 less than one percent of people living with HIV/AIDS were screened for TB.

One of the greatest challenges facing independent humanitarian action today is that of reaching civilians caught in war and armed conflicts. Nowhere is this more frustratingly illustrated than in Iraq, where MSF has struggled to gain a meaningful foothold since the US-led invasion of 2003. Various military and political actors have sought to use and abuse humanitarian action for political purposes and in doing so have made humanitarian organizations a target for violent attacks. This has undermined the ability of MSF, and other neutral humanitarian organizations to address critical needs of the civilian population.

Sudan continued to be wracked by two major humanitarian emergencies in 2008—the crisis in Darfur and the consequences of decades of civil war in the south.

The fighting between government forces and anti-government militants in the North West Frontier Province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan has intensified throughout 2008. Air strikes by United States military in the area have also increased insecurity. In August, thousands of Pakistanis were displaced within the country or fled to neighboring Afghanistan for safety. At the same time, the Pakistani army also began expelling Afghan refugees, specifically in Bajaur Agency, for alleged connections to militant groups.

Continued violence and harsh climatic conditions have made living a constant struggle for people in the crisis-affected area of Ethiopia’s Somali region this year. Caught between rebel groups based in the region and government forces intent on quelling the rebellion, the largely nomadic population has become ever more isolated from basic services and humanitarian assistance.

Food riots around the world early in 2008 brought into sharp relief the impact of rising food prices on communities as far as apart as Haiti, Bangladesh, and Ivory Coast. Less visible, though more deadly and pervasive, was the ongoing crisis in childhood malnutrition. While combating hunger depends on having access to food in sufficient quantity, conquering malnutrition also means assuring foods of adequate nutritional quality. For young, malnourished children, foods rich in nutrients, vitamins, and minerals are essential to survival and development.

Since September 2007 renewed fighting in North Kivu has caused massive displacement in the region. A ceasefire agreement signed in January 2008 was not respected, and by the end of August large-scale fighting had broken out again in the region between various armed groups and the Congolese armed forces (FARDC), despite the presence of the world’s largest UN peacekeeping force, MONUC.

The first months of 2008 marked a period of further economic meltdown and political violence throughout Zimbabwe. While the country has been in crisis for years, the situation deteriorated to ever more alarming levels, with inflation of 231 million percent, shortages of essential goods, repression of opposition supporters, and additional restrictions on humanitarian organizations in the lead up to contested elections in June.

On May 2, 2008, Cyclone Nargis, in all its horror, threw Myanmar back into the international spotlight, devastating the Irrawaddy Delta and leaving an estimated 130,000 people missing or dead. Governed by a military regime since 1962 and enduring low-intensity conflict in certain areas, the disaster was the latest blow to a people largely forgotten by the outside world.

New York, NY, December 22, 2008 — Massive forced civilian displacements, violence, and unmet medical needs in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Iraq, Sudan, and Pakistan, along with neglected medical emergencies in Myanmar and Zimbabwe, are some of the worst humanitarian and medical emergencies in the world, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reported today in its annual list of the "Top Ten" humanitarian crises.

For the last 11 years, the international medical assistance group Doctors Without Borders has released its list of the top 10 humanitarian crises.

New York, December 20, 2007 — People struggling to survive violence, forced displacement, and disease in the Central African Republic (CAR), Somalia, Sri Lanka, and elsewhere often went underreported in the news this year and much of the past decade, according to the 10th annual list of the “Top Ten” Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories, released today by the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

New York, January 9, 2007 — The staggering human toll taken by tuberculosis and malnutrition as well as the devastation caused by wars in the Central African Republic (CAR), Sri Lanka, and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), are among the "Top Ten" Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2006, according to the year-end list released today by the international humanitarian medical aid organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The ninth annual list also highlights the lack of media attention paid to the plight of people affected by the consequences of conflict in Haiti, Somalia, Colombia, Chechnya, and central India.

New York, January 12, 2006 — The immense human toll caused by conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Haiti, Chechnya, and northeast India are among the "Top Ten" Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2005, according to the year-end list released today by the international humanitarian medical aid organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The eighth annual list also highlights the lack of media attention paid to the plight of people trapped by chronic wars in Colombia, northern Uganda, and Ivory Coast, unrelenting crises in Somalia and southern Sudan, as well as the utter lack of research and development devoted to new HIV/AIDS tools adapted for impoverished settings.

New York, January 19, 2005- Soaring tuberculosis (TB) deaths and the immense toll on people living through chronic conflicts in Chechnya, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Northern Uganda are among the "Top Ten" Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2004, according to the yearly list released today by the international humanitarian medical aid organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The seventh annual list also highlights the lack of media attention in the United States paid to unrelenting crises in North Korea and Somalia, an emergency in Liberia one year after the end of civil war, the constant threat of hunger and disease in Ethiopia, and how Burundi's health financing system excludes its poorest citizens from even the most basic health care.

New York, January 6, 2004 -- An escalating refugee crisis along the border of Sudan and Chad as well as chronic conflicts in Colombia, Chechnya, Burundi, and Democratic Republic of Congo are among the Top 10 Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2003, according to the yearly list released today by the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The sixth annual list also highlights the lack of media attention paid to the high death toll from malaria this year, ongoing unremitting crises in North Korea and Somalia, a new war in Ivory Coast, and the threats posed by regional trade agreements on poor people's access to life-saving medicines.