With a severe shortage of protective equipment needed to fight the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, MSF is urging European states to show solidarity and share materials. Press Release - 16 Mar 2020

A general view of the olive grove next to the official camp of Moria.
At the moment, 13,000 people stranded in a camp designed to host just 3,000. People in the olive grove have to share their tents with other people with whom, they don’t have any previous relationship. The level of hygiene is very low and people have to share a toilet with another 90 people and a shower with 200. When it rains the tents are getting wet and the area turns into a muddy swamp.
MSF team in the pediatric clinic in Moria see an average of 100 children and pregnant women per day. Currently with the recent increase of arrivals our team is struggling to respond to the need that arising. Most of the children our teams see are suffering from diseases which are directly connected with the living conditions such, respiratory tract infections, skin diseases, fever and diarrhea. We also receive children with chronic and complex medical cases who need specialized attention that is not available. Yet, they have to spend months living in unhygienic and unsafe conditions before they are moved to mainland in order to get the much-needed treatment.

Refugees, IDPs and people on the move

Evacuation of squalid Greek camps more urgent than ever over COVID-19 fears

MSF is calling for the immediate evacuation of migrants and refugees stuck living in unhygienic, cramped conditions on the Greek islands, in the wake of the first confirmed case of COVID-19 coronavirus on Lesbos. Press Release - 12 Mar 2020

Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic

MSF starts COVID-19 response activities in four northern Italian hospitals

With hospitals in northern Italy under immense pressure from the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, MSF staff have stepped in to provide support in four hospitals. Press Release - 12 Mar 2020

Mastana (65) at the female inpatient ward. She is from Lashkar Bazar and was brought to the hospital because of hyper tension. She was taken to Pakistan first.
Boost hospital is run by MSF in partnership with the Ministry of Public Health. It is one of the biggest MSF runs worldwide: 300 beds, 700 national staff, 25 international staff.

Afghanistan

Afghans face impossible choices in their struggle for medical care

Afghans still struggle to access medical care due to insecurity, distance, cost and the fact that many health facilities lack staff and equipment. MSF has released a new report on the barriers faced in Afghanistan in reaching care. Press Release - 5 Mar 2020

In the Dahr-el-Jebel detention centre, between the towns of Zintan and Yefren, nearly 500 people, most from Eritrea and Somalia, remain locked up. The majority is stranded in this mountainous region, south of Tripoli, after being transferred there in September 2018 during armed clashes in the capital. Away from the immediate danger of the fighting, they were forgotten by almost everyone. When MSF began working there in May 2019, we were horrified to discover that at least 22 migrants and refugees had died of diseases, mainly tuberculosis. IOM and UNHCR were supposed to provide assistance, including medical care and protection services. Today the medical situation remains worrying. Our teams working in this detention centre may not see widespread abuses committed by the guards that are common in other centres, but the protracted detention and the uncertainty are becoming every day more unbearable for our patients. More than a hundred of those held in the Dhar-el-Jebel detention centre are unaccompanied children.

Libya

Arbitrary detention in Libya must end as asylum seeker dies in detention centre fire

A fire in a detention centre in western Libya has resulted in the death of a young man, as MSF calls for the end of arbitrary detention of migrants and asylum seekers in Libya and to immediately evacuate and resettle people. Press Release - 2 Mar 2020

Syria

Horrific day of indiscriminate attacks on civilians in Idlib, Syria

Indiscriminate attacks continue in civilian areas in northwestern Syria's Idlib province. Three hospitals near the frontlines that are supported by MSF received 185 wounded, and 18 patients dead-on-arrival. Press Release - 26 Feb 2020

One of the main bridges of the city, which is a transit point where travellers use to rest before continuing their journey on the Beast, the cargo train that conects the south and north borders of Mexico.

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Uno de los puentes principales de la ciudad, la cual es un punto de tránsito donde los viajeros suelen tomar un descanso antes de continuar su viaje a bordo de la Bestia, el tren de carga que conecta las fronteras sur y norte de México.

Central American migration

Escaping violence into danger – no way out for Central American migrants

A new MSF report shows violence at home is a key push factor for many in Central America to make the dangerous journey north to the US, while exposing the devastating effects that the criminalisation of migration is having on people. Press Release - 11 Feb 2020

MSF is responding to the needs of people affected by the punitive and ever-changing immigration policies of the U.S. and Mexico on the countries' border. People fleeing violence and poverty, most from countries of the Northern Triangle of Central America, but also from other parts of the world, are taking shelter in Matamoros, just across the border from Brownsville, Texas, in the U.S. Some 2,000 people—men, women and children—are living in tents by the international bridge. They receive few services and are largely reliant on volunteers from the U.S. and Mexico that bring food, clean water and clothing. At the bridge encampment, and at shelters in the area, MSF is providing mental health and social services, as well as medical care. Most people at the border are waiting for asylum court hearings across the bridge. Most wait for months; some have recently received court dates a year from now. Matamoros, like other Mexican cities along the border, is not a safe place for migrants and asylum seekers. When they arrive in these cities with nowhere to go and no protection, they become prey for organized crime. Many have been kidnapped and extorted, and have been victims of sexual violence. A lot of these people have also experienced violence along the route north through Mexico.

Central American migration

The devastating toll of 'Remain in Mexico' asylum policy one year later

The cruel and inhumane Remain in Mexico policy - which pushes asylum seekers back into Mexico from the US - has been in place for a year and continues to endanger the lives of vulnerable people. Press Release - 29 Jan 2020

“My son, Mohammed, is almost 3 years old and is suffering from brain disorders. Due to the disease he is having contant headaches and he doesn’t talk much… we try to make him talk but whenever he tries he mumbles. At the moment we live in a tent in the olive grove without electivity and heating. The toilets and the showers are far and there is no warm for bathing him so I only wash him once every two weeks. The doctor suggest us to keep good hygiene but it’s impossible. We try to keep our tent clean but when it rains there is everywhere mud. As a mother, I don’t even care about myself, I only care about my children. When Mohammed complains about the headaches he has due to the disease I know I can do nothing to help him, I only cry. We are here 3,5 months and all the doctors who saw Mohammed here say that he really need to be transferred to mainland in order to receive care for his disease but are still here in Moria”. *Gul, from Afghanistan, mother of 2 living in the Olive Groove in Moria.
At the moment there are more than 19.000 people living in Moria camp which was initially made to host 3.000 people. For the past 4 months MSF doctors have seen at least 140 children with chronic and complex cases who have no access to medication and the specialized care they need. Some of them if they left untreated they might face life-long consequences or even death.

Greece

Greece denies healthcare to seriously ill refugee children on Lesbos

Children who are suffering from chronic and complex diseases, such as heart disease and asthma and are forced to live in unhygienic conditions in Moria camp, Greece, with no appropriate health care and medication. Press Release - 23 Jan 2020

MSF Greece Director of Medical Operational Support Unit, Apostolos Veizis, holding a sign advocating for broader use of the pneumonia vaccine at a lower price

Access to medicines

Gavi must ensure more children get new, more affordable pneumonia vaccine

As vaccine funder Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, celebrates its 20th anniversary, MSF is using the occasion to call out the organisation to ensure more children are protected against deadly pneumonia with a new, more affordable, vaccine. Press Release - 21 Jan 2020

Four mothers posing in a corridor of the Hospital in Bili. All four of them are staying in the hospital with their child, that's suffering from a severe case of malaria. Since the beginning of the project in 2016, the pediatric ward already treated more than 4.000 cases of complicated/severe form of malaria.

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)

Independent medical humanitarian assistance

We provide medical assistance to people affected by conflict, epidemics, disasters, or exclusion from healthcare. Our teams are made up of tens of thousands of health professionals, logistic and administrative staff - most of them hired locally. Our actions are guided by medical ethics and the principles of independence and impartiality. We are a non-profit, self-governed, member-based organisation.

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Help and solidarity needed in Europe to protect medical staff from COVID-19