Aid ‘inefficiently’ distributed in Iraq
The World Health Organization has highlighted the problems facing medical teams working in Iraq.
Doctors and nurses are reported not to have access to life-saving drugs despite the medical supplies being delivered to the country.
Oxfam reported today that convoys carrying basic medical supplies had reached Baghdad this week.
“The distribution system has not functioned since the recent conflict began, due to a number of obvious limitations on transport, coordination and communications,” the agency explained, noting that parts of Baghdad and other areas “are running short of medicines despite the fact that some of these medicines are available in nearby warehouses.”
The WHO has agreed to take measures in conjunction with the coalition administration, including ensuring that full and accessible inventories are made, improving organization of the warehouses, and planning the allocation of drugs and other resources.
IT systems for warehouses, and funds for transportation and staff are being supplied.
Oxfam, along with other NGOs, has been helping to supply clinics for Architects for People in Need (APN) throughout the war.
The clinics report that the doctors are now seeing fewer war injuries but there are particular problems with water-borne diseases including typhoid and cholera.
Water is the key to many of the problems in Iraq, according to Oxfam, whose workers have been lobbying the US-run Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance to install proper sanitation, as it is obliged to do under the Geneva Convention.
The British-based charity is also working in conjunction with the UN to rebuild the water and sanitation infrastructure.
There are similar problems in the South, with raw sewage building up in the streets, although in many homes the water supply is now better than it was before the war.
There are concerns that the aid agencies, which are already struggling to meet the needs of the population, will be overwhelmed when Iraqi refugees who left before the war return.
It was today revealed that Iran is expelling 200,000 Iraqi refugees following the end of the military campaign. They are expected to be sent to Basra before being resettled.
