Water is not sure to drink in a large part of Sudan torn by war. But people have no choice

Two weeks ago, a human body was removed from a well in a refugee camp in Sudan, according to doctors without borders. Two days later, people were drinking water again.

It is a painful illustration of the situation that Sudan residents faced after almost 2 and a half years of civil war, explains Sylvain Penicaud, project coordinator for the organization of world aid.

Overcrowded camps, heavy rains and a lack of hygiene supplies have favored the perfect storm for cholera, a painful and fatal disease of water, to spread.

“Displaced persons are extremely exposed to these types of health problems created by dangerous water,” said Penicaud In this case The guest animator Aarti Pole. “People have no choice but to obtain water (under) as horrible conditions.”

Hundreds of thousands of people flee the besieged city

Sudan has been at war since April 2023, when the fighting broke out in the capital of Khartoum between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary quick support forces.

Since then, violence has spread to other parts of the country, killing more than 50,000 people, moving 12.5 million and pushing a lot on the brink of famine, according to the United Nations.

These crossed crises are all exhibited in Tawila, a small town in the state of Darfur du Nord, where Penicaud works with doctors without borders to provide health care to hundreds of thousands of people displaced internally.

About 300,000 people have come to Tawila since the start of the conflict, increasing the city’s population ten times.

“I think most people cannot imagine what it is to have almost half a million people in the same place at an extreme level of vulnerability, essentially missing,” said Penicaud.

Most people who refute there, he says, are women and children who fled the state besieged from the state, El-Fasher, a hot spot in the conflict.

“They fled the fights with almost nothing in their pockets, just a few supplies, clothes (and) cooking materials, but that’s all,” said Penicaud.

The United Nations Security Council reiterated its appeal to the RSF on Wednesday to take up its siege in El-Fasher, while denouncing the group’s plan to resume its offensive in the city and establish a rival government in the Sudan regions which it controls.

The United Nations Global Food Program requires access to El-Fasher to provide help to people facing famine.

“As an adaptation mechanism, some residents of the region have survived animal fodder and food waste,” said spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric.

Canada has also joined 29 other countries to ask RSF to end the headquarters and both so that both parties accept a humanitarian break and guarantee the “sure passage of civilians to leave the areas of active hostilities on a voluntary basis, in the direction they choose”.

“This cannot continue,” reads the declaration, signed by Randeep Sarai, Secretary of State of Canada for International Development.

The cholera vaccine campaign deploys

Meanwhile, Sudanese health officials are launching a 10 -day vaccination campaign for cholera in Khartoum.

Resident Montaser Al-Sayed said he and his family had recently returned home after being moved by fighting. They feared cholera in chaotic conditions, but said that the vaccination campaign had reassured them.

“As a mother, I was relieved,” said another resident, Razaz Abdullah.

Several cholera vaccine campaigns have been deployed across Sudan since the epidemic was declared last year. But it turned out to be almost impossible to keep the disease under control as the war continues.

Bacterial infection spreads through contaminated foods and drinking water, causing diarrhea, dehydration – and if it is not treated, death.

Doctors Without Borders estimate that there were 99,700 cases of cholera in Sudan and more than 2,470 deaths linked since July 2024.

In the Darfur region alone, the aid group treated more than 2,300 cholera patients and recorded 40 deaths in last week in establishments managed by the Ministry of Health.

Penicaud says that people in the camps simply do not have enough water to meet their needs.

The rainy season, he says, aggravates things as the floods contaminate water supply and sewer systems.

Meanwhile, fighting, lack of financial donations and muddy and dangerous roads all make it difficult to obtain supplies to those who need it.

“The situation is extremely urgent, but also the constraints in terms of supplies are enormous,” said Penicaud. “It is very difficult for us and other humanitarian organizations to expand our operations and provide assistance to such a large number of displaced people.”

He calls on international donors to intensify.

Doctors Without Borders believe that he will need $ 100 million to adopt an adequate response plan on Tawila alone. But in July, said Penicaud, the organization increased only by five percent of this.

“We know that there are a lot of discussions with different donors to increase the level of response,” he said, “but it is really urgent to develop operations here in Tawila.”