Heat-related illnesses more than double in Iraq’s camps

MEDIA RELEASE

6 September 2017

Heat-related illnesses more than double in Iraq’s camps

There has been a sharp increase in heat-related illnesses amongst war-impacted children and adults living in camps in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, World Vision warned today. As temperatures soar to almost 50 degrees day after day in the camps, World Vision doctors have seen cases of water-borne diseases, such as diarrhoea, increase by more than two and a half times.

Since 2014, more than 3.3 million people in Iraq have been forced to flee their homes and seek shelter from the violent conflict. Approximately 769,000 children and adults now live in very remote camps with basic services.

“Living in these camps is like being in a fan-forced oven 24 hours a day,” World Vision’s Iraq Response Director, Ian Dawes, said. “There’s almost no shade in the camps to provide relief, and children are sleeping on the ground in baking hot tents.

“The extreme temperatures are compromising food and hygiene in the camps, which is contributing to a huge increase in heat-related illnesses. World Vision is extremely concerned about children’s health.”

Four-year-old Moratab arrived at a World Vision clinic a few weeks ago listless and very sick. Her family had fled the ISIL-controlled city of Hawija.

“She's been vomiting for three days,” said her uncle Watban. “Everything she eats she vomits up, and she is always weak and unwell. She sleeps for too long. She got medicine yesterday.”

Although Mosul has been re-taken from ISIL, other cities are still under siege and families continue to flood into camps. Some people are also too scared to return to home, or cannot go back because their houses have been destroyed.

“The danger we face with the retaking of Mosul, is that international donors may turn their attention to other crisis,” Dawes said. “But the humanitarian crisis in and around Mosul is far from over. Funding will be needed more than ever in the coming months and years to repair the damage wrought by years of catastrophic conflict.

“If Iraq’s children are to have any hope of recovery, we cannot forsake them now. World Vision is calling on donors and the international community to provide urgent funding to support Iraq’s children.”

World Vision is working in camps throughout the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. The organisation provides immediate assistance to families as they arrive in the camps including food, water, mattresses and healthcare, as well as longer-term education, protection and economic development programs to ensure they can recover and start rebuilding their lives.