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In Pictures: South Sudan’s doctor shortage

Remote corners of South Sudan are suffering from a severe lack of proper medical infrastructure.

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Northern Bahr el Ghazal, South Sudan(***)s poorest state, saw catastrophic rates of malaria infections during the wet season this year, more than four times the cases recorded last year.
By Ashley Hamer
Published On 14 Dec 2014

Aweil, South Sudan – Northern Bahr el Ghazal is South Sudan’s poorest state and is generally neglected by national and international aid organisations, which focus instead on regions of active conflict.

It has one principal hospital in the main town of Aweil, and aid group Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) runs the facility in partnership with the Ministry of Health. The hospital caters to the entire state and a regional population of up to 1.4 million.

The ministry has four doctors and MSF usually has five on duty at any one time.

In 2007-2008, MSF launched a project in Aweil to help reduce maternal mortality rates, which was about 50 percent at the time.

This year, catastrophic rates of malaria infections have plagued Northern Bahr el Ghazal during the wet season from March to October – four times the cases from 2013. MSF in Aweil recorded some 20,000 treatments given for the disease in the past five months. 

Infection levels have finally started to come down with the onset of the dry season, but in recent months thousands of people came for screenings and more than 70 percent tested positive for the disease. 

Médecins Sans Frontières is among the few NGOs providing healthcare in the region with malaria outreach missions and other services.
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In September and October, at the height of the malaria outbreak in Northern Bahr el Ghazal, 70 percent of the people screened for the disease tested positive.
MSF provides free testing and treatment in a remote border region of South Sudan, where buying medication on the local market can cost as much as $50 for people who have no cash income whatsoever.
In recent months, during periodic healthcare missions across the area, up to 1,000 people gathered to be screened for malaria. 
Malaria was the primary cause of death for people in Northern Bahr el Ghazal this wet season, one of the worst years ever recorded for victims of the disease in South Sudan. 
Families, including pregnant women, must walk several days to reach the few clinics providing maternity care and malaria screening.
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MSF provides healthcare for pregnant women and for children under the age of 15.
In Aweil hospital, MSF also runs the maternity and premature infant wards, delivering 15-20 babies every day, many born prematurely or underweight. 
MSF cannot take in babies born weighing less than 1.25kg because the hospital lacks the facilities to care for them at such a dangerously small size. There are no incubators and limited capacity for complicated surgical procedures.