MSF Brings Emergency Aid to Pakistan

August 11, 2010

Two weeks after floods hit areas of Pakistan, MSF has sent 110 tons of water-and-sanitation equipment, drugs, and medical and logistical material into the country. More supplies will follow according to the needs identified. More than 100 international staff are currently working alongside 1,200 Pakistanis in MSF programs in Pakistan.

A man is pictured with two of his grandchildren in a high school building where they have been living, in the town of Sukkur, Sindh Province. Schools all over Pakistan have been turned into temporary homes for people displaced by the floods.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

A woman staying at the high school holds her newborn baby. Once schools reopen, many displaced people like her have no shelter at all. MSF is ramping up its relief item distribution

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

Men, women, and children staying at the high school receive medical care from an MSF team. MSF continues to conduct mobile clinic consultations and assessments in places where displaced people are sheltering in and around the town of Sukkur.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

The MSF teams screen children for malnutrition and provide ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) to malnourished children. MSF has treated 232 severely malnourished children in Sukkur and referred 42 with medical complications to its intensive therapeutic feeding center in Railway Hospital.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

Children are examined and treated by MSF medical staff at the high school where they are staying. “There are about 200 camps in Sukkur’s urban area, and it is challenging… to locate pockets of acutely malnourished children,” said Sylvain Groulx, MSF’s project coordinator in Sukkur. Groulx says the situation is likely to be the same in more isolated rural areas, where MSF teams plan to begin working next.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

Children receive rehydration salts at Civil Hospital in Sukkur. The MSF team has set up 20 oral rehydration points where staff can assess and treat patients suffering from diarrhea, and refer them to a diarrhea treatment center if necessary.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

A mother gives her child rehydration salts at the Civil Hospital. MSF is also providing 75,000 liters (19,800 gallons) of clean drinking water through water trucks, tanks, and bladders in Sukkur.

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell

Children wait to receive rehydration salts at the Civil Hospital. MSF teams are providing hygiene education services to the community, and distributing soap to displaced people in camps. “We are still very worried about potential epidemic outbreaks,” said Sylvain Groulx. “All of the elements conducive for this to happen are present – poor sanitation and water supplies, and people living in cramped conditions in open camp settings.”

Pakistan 2010 © Andrew McConnell