Red Cross Blogs

Posts tagged ‘Pakistan’

---

Worldwide disaster response round-up

We recently launched our Pakistan Floods Appeal. Here’s a brief round-up of some of the ways the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is helping people in Pakistan and in other countries around the world.

Pakistan: In Pakistan, monsoon rains and floods are causing widespread destruction. Over five million people have been affected. Families have lost their livelihoods, and overcrowded and unsanitary conditions in temporary relief camps mean many people risk disease.

Some of the areas affected are still recovering from last year’s flooding, including Sindh province, which is once again one of the worst-hit areas.

The British Red Cross worked with the Pakistan Red Crescent and International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies to prepare for this year’s monsoon rains. A grant of £1.7 million from the Department for International Development (DFID) enabled the Red Cross to pre-position emergency stocks in the country.

The Pakistan Red Crescent – with support from the Red Cross – is now providing health support, producing clean water, and distributing food parcels and other aid.

Read more about how we’re helping in Pakistan

Donate to the Pakistan Floods Appeal

Middle East and north Africa: The Red Cross is helping people in many countries across the Middle East and north Africa.

As front lines shift in disputed areas of Libya, the ICRC is working with the Libyan Red Crescent to provide medical assistance, visit hundreds of detainees and deliver aid.

Violence in Syria continues to escalate. Recently, a Syrian Arab Red Crescent volunteer died – and two more volunteers were injured – when their ambulance was caught in heavy fire while evacuating an injured person to a hospital. The unprecedented levels of violence have caused the ICRC to call upon the authorities, demonstrators and all others involved to respect human life and dignity at all times.

Donate to the Libya & Region Appeal

East Africa: As famine, drought and conflict in the Horn of Africa continues, the Red Cross movement is helping people across the region. In Somalia, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) remains one of the few humanitarian agencies able to work in the southern and central parts of the country.

Over the past 18 months the British Red Cross has provided £1.2 million for programmes across East Africa. It recently released a total of £2.25 million to support people in southern central Somalia.

The Red Cross is also helping support food security in the region through longer-term projects, including maintaining local water supplies, running school feeding programmes, providing healthcare and promoting sustainable farming.

Read the World Disasters Report 2011, which highlights the growing pressure of food insecurity and malnutrition on populations across the globe.

Donate to the East Africa Food Crisis Appeal

Japan: Six months ago, an earthquake and tsunami devastated huge areas of Japan. To date, Red Cross and Red Crescent National Societies worldwide have received donations totalling £323 million – including more than £13 million to the British Red Cross.

Appeal funds are supporting the Japanese Red Cross relief and recovery programme, which includes providing medical care and psycho-social support to survivors. The Japanese Red Cross also plans to build temporary hospitals.

Read more about how appeal funds will help Japan recover

Nepal, India and China: On 18 September, a deadly earthquake struck the Himalayan region bordering north India and Nepal. The earthquake measured 6.9 on the Richter scale and killed at least 100 people.

Teams from the Red Cross National Societies of Nepal, India and China have been mobilised and some are working on the ground, providing emergency relief and medical support to survivors in their respective countries.

Read more on how the Red Cross is helping

*The Movement is made of 186 National Societies (including the British Red Cross), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

---

Comment on this post »

---

---

---

One year on from Pakistan’s worst floods in 80 years, around 12 million people are still struggling to survive without any sustained means of income.

Pakistan is still suffering. The scale of the disaster, which began at the end of July 2010, was huge: one fifth of the country was submerged in water and a staggering 20 million people were affected.

Paula Baizan, British Red Cross recovery programme manager, says: “The Pakistan Red Crescent was quick to respond and with support from international Red Cross partners has helped more than two million people with emergency relief.

“The focus now is on helping communities recover their livelihoods and strengthening their resilience for future emergency situations.”

After the trauma they experienced last year and with another monsoon season on the doorstep, many survivors are fearful there will be more devastating floods.

“People are afraid of the sound of running water,” says Ea Suzanne Akasha, psychosocial delegate for the Danish Red Cross. “Some had so little time to flee and are still suffering panic attacks. They don’t know how they will cope if it happens again.”

 

Teaching vulnerable communities how to identify potential threats, and setting up village committees to plan and prepare for disasters is at the core of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies flood recovery programme.

This also involves getting committees to register with the government so they are linked in with early warning systems. Ultimately, the programme will benefit 172,000 people in 39 villages prone to hazards.

“We’re also helping people make their homes stronger, so they’ll be safer during the next disaster,” explains Khalid Hassan, a volunteer with the Pakistan Red Crescent Society in Sindh province. “Before the floods, people built their houses on the ground. We are now telling them to build on a base of at least four feet, using six pieces of timber in one wall, instead of the usual three.”

As families struggle to get back on their feet, hunger and malnutrition are real threats, particularly for millions of women and children. Those who lost everything in the floods are saying that what they really need help with is finding ways to generate their own income, so they no longer need depend on aid.

The Federation’s recovery programme, which the British Red Cross is supporting, will give cash grants to around 5,000 families. This will help them start small businesses in farming, tailoring, transportation, handicrafts and grocery shops.

Find out more about how we’re helping people recover from the Pakistan floods.

---

Comment on this post »

---

---

---

Every year, nearly two million children die from preventable diseases. Pneumonia and diarrhoea (rotavirus) are the two biggest killers, responsible for around 40 per cent of childhood deaths. A simple vaccine could save many of those children’s lives.

Today, donors and representatives from governments and aid agencies are meeting in London to find ways of funding a global immunisation campaign that would make new vaccines available for the world’s poorest children.

GAVI (the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisations) is a partnership of public and private sector organisations working together to improve children’s access to life-saving vaccines.

In the last decade, an estimated 280 million children who hadn’t previously been vaccinated received jabs through GAVI-supported programmes. The alliance estimates 5 million children’s lives have been saved.

But there’s a funding gap for future programmes. If the alliance could raise $3.7 billion (around £2.2 billion), they hope to save 4 million more children by 2015.

The Red Cross endorses GAVI’s call to action. We’ve supported immunisation campaigns in some of the world’s poorest areas. In Haiti, even before the earthquake many children weren’t immunised against measles. After the quake, as many moved to crowded camps, the international community realized children needed to vaccinated as soon as possible to prevent a major health catastrophe. The Red Cross supported the Ministry of Health to vaccinate all children in displacement camps. With our support, over 152,300 people were immunised between 6 February and 15 March.

In Pakistan, the British Red Cross supports the Pakistan Red Crescent’s mobile health units, which vaccinate people in remote villages in Baluchistan, near the border with Kandahar.

And in West Africa, we support community health programmes in Sierra Leone and Liberia, focusing on children under five and women of child-bearing age. Trained volunteers and staff help their clients understand and access life-saving immunisations.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies chairs the GAVI civil society constituency, representing relief and voluntary organisations that carry out health services around the world.

They have issued their own call to action (pdf), asking not only for donors to fill the funding gap but also that the alliance supports health workers and makes sure vaccines are affordable for developing countries.

Vaccination is every child’s right. And today is an opportunity to make it a reality.

---

Comment on this post »

---

---

---

In Ivory Coast around one million people have had to leave their homes. With many people fleeing into neighbouring countries, over 100,000 refugees have sought safety in Liberia, more than 2,000 in Ghana, over 1,000 in Guinea and hundreds more elsewhere in the region. It is estimated that 60 per cent of refugees are children.

Food, water supply and sanitation conditions in Liberian host communities are under enormous strain, with reported outbreaks of yellow fever and cholera.

The Red Cross is working in the region to help more than 100,000 people. It is distributing emergency relief items, assisting wounded people and providing medical items, water, sanitation, seeds and tools.

Donate to our Ivory Coast Crisis Appeal.

Read more about the situation in Ivory Coast and why the appeal was launched now.

Libya and region: In Libya, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) now has an office in Benghazi, and a logistical base and a warehouse in the eastern city of Tobruk. In the city of Ajdabiya it has provided about 15,000 people with food and essential household items, and supplied the main hospital with medical equipment.

As the conflict continues, lives are increasingly at risk. At the invitation of the Libyan authorities the ICRC has met with key Libyan government figures to discuss the expansion of the organisation’s humanitarian activities to the entire country.

The ICRC and the IFRC continue to work with Red Cross and Red Crescent National Societies in Egypt, Tunisia and Italy to help people fleeing the conflict. The British Red Cross is working in Tunisia to provide sanitation and promote hygiene in camps near the border, and to help manage the arrival and distribution of relief items.

The ICRC has visited over 80 Libyan servicemen and other people held by the armed opposition in Benghazi to check on their treatment and conditions. The ICRC has also warned that weapon contamination now represents a major hazard for the country’s civilian population.

Donate to our Libya and Region Appeal.

Japan: Following the earthquake and tsunami, more than 484 Japanese Red Cross medical teams, involving about 3,000 doctors, nurses and support staff, have been deployed in the affected prefectures. They have been assessing the needs of the survivors, and providing basic healthcare services and psychosocial support to evacuees.

The Japanese Red Cross has distributed over 125,500 blankets and 20,700 emergency relief packs.

Donate to our Japan Tsunami Appeal.

New Zealand: After an earthquake which left more than 160 people dead and at least 2,500 injured, the New Zealand Red Cross is now helping with long-term recovery in the country. Processing centres have been set up to help distribute emergency and hardship grants to the worst affected.

Donate to our New Zealand Earthquake Appeal.

Somalia: Severe drought, coupled with outbreaks of heavy fighting, has left 32 per cent of Somalia’s population – around 2.4 million people – in need of humanitarian assistance.

Since the beginning of the drought, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has distributed emergency supplies to half a million people throughout Somalia and has delivered water to almost one million. The ICRC is providing long-term support to 36 clinics and 14 outpatient therapeutic feeding centres. With the ICRC’s help, the Somali Red Crescent Society recently opened two new health clinics in Middle Juba, a region of southern Somalia affected by conflict and drought. These two clinics alone will benefit over 100,000 people in the region.

In March, the British Red Cross gave £110,000 from its Disaster Fund to help the Somali Red Crescent assist those affected by the drought.

Read more on the drought in Somalia and how the Red Cross is helping.

Yemen: After violence which left some people dead and many injured, the situation has further deteriorated in the north of the country. Renewed armed clashes have occurred in Sa’ada and Al-Jawf. Many families in camps for displaced people and elsewhere are fully dependent on humanitarian aid provided by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Yemen Red Crescent.

The ICRC has called upon the country’s healthcare facilities to admit any injured person regardless of their affiliations and for medical personnel to exercise total impartiality.

Read more about the situation in Yemen and how the Red Cross is helping.

*The Movement is made of 186 National Societies (including the British Red Cross), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

---

Comment on this post »

---

---

---

Penny Sims, Red Cross communications delegate, reports back from Pakistan:

Sometimes, being so far away from home, it’s good to see some things are universal. I’m at the Pakistan Red Crescent office in Dadu with around 40 volunteers, for a first aid training session.

I only have a few words of Urdu, but first aid really does transcend any language barrier. Watching the video ‘A first aider in every home’ I see familiar situations – falls, trips, burns, cuts.

Other aspects of first aid training appear to cross boundaries as well; the video is good, with some believably gory wounds, but there’s still a comedy moment of bad ‘oh dear, I’ve just fallen down the stairs’ acting that has everyone in fits of giggles.

The video takes us through the essentials – checking if a casualty is conscious, breathing, the DRAB check list (danger, response, airways, breathing – and calling for help). Knowing basic first aid is important for everybody, but in flood-affected regions like KN Shah it is vital – the village roads have been corroded by the flood water, or are strewn with debris, so access to emergency health care could be many hours away.

The training is part of a Pakistan Red Crescent programme supported by the German and Danish Red Cross, which combines deliveries of aid items such as blankets, tarpaulins and kitchen sets, with psychological support and useful training for local villagers.

The programme is helping 35 villages and will include building six community centres. Volunteers are going out to the villages to provide psychological support, but also first aid training and demonstrations in how to purify water.

It’s important not only to address people’s physical needs, but also their emotional and psychological needs.

Visit the British Red Cross website to read Dr Solangi’s story about helping address survivors’ psychological problems.

Image 1 © IFRC

---

Comment on this post »

---

---