(December 7, 2013) - The United Nations Refugee Agency Friday noted a fall in the infant and maternal mortality rate in refugee camps in Unity and Upper Nile States.
UNHCR Spokesperson Tim Irwin said that over the past eight months, deaths among children and adults in the camps have fallen to within International indicators of one death per 10,000 people per day.
Irwin attributed the decrease to strengthening of health care systems. He said humanitarian agencies have now moved from emergency response to a more stable phase of building livelihoods.
“As you know there is hard way and a soft way. The hard way is you put in proper latrines so people are not just using the open ground; you put in stations so that people can wash their hands with soap,” he said. “The soft way is about changing the peoples’ behaviors, and both are equally important because if people realized that Hyphathetis E, for instance, can be spread if one doesn’t wash his/her before eating they will do it. So we need to provide the infrastructure and improve peoples’ awareness.”
Currently there are more than 120,000 refugees living in six camps in Upper Nile and Unity States.