The United Nations children’s agency, UNICEF, said on Friday that over a million polio vaccine doses intended for children have been destroyed during the civil war in Sudan.
“A number of cold chain facilities have been looted, damaged and destroyed, including over a million polio vaccines in South Darfur,” UNICEF deputy director of emergency programs Hazel De Wet told Reuters.
De Wet said a large stockpile of polio vaccines was kept in Sudan to assist with a major vaccination drive launched after an outbreak of a variant poliovirus in December 2022.
Sudan had battled a significant outbreak the previous summer, but health officials believe that outbreak was contained in August 2022 after infecting 58 children in 15 out of Sudan’s 18 states.
“Cold chain facilities” are systems of storage and transportation designed to keep temperature-sensitive vaccines in good condition until they can be administered. As De Wet’s comment implied, polio vaccines would quickly be ruined once looters removed them from refrigerated storage.
Reuters noted the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) has logged 28 attacks on healthcare facilities in Sudan since war broke out last month between army commander Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan and his former partner in the ruling junta, Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia commander Mohammed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo.
W.H.O. warned in late April that combatants have targeted hospitals and laboratories on both sides of the conflict. Sometimes the attackers stole medical supplies or demanded treatment for their comrades, while on other occasions they destroyed clinics so their opponents could not take advantage of them. W.H.O. noted that some of these laboratories store dangerous pathogens for vaccine research.
Last Thursday, the World Food Program (WFP) said looters had stolen at least $13 million worth of food products intended for humanitarian aid from warehouses and trucks during the Sudan conflict. The WFP said it was scrambling to replace the stolen supplies before Sudanese civilians suffered a major food crisis.
“It’s been four days without electricity and our situation is difficult. We are the victims of a war that we aren’t a part of. No one cares about the citizens,” a dejected resident of Khartoum told Reuters on Friday.
Outside observers see Burhan and Dagalo’s forces as evenly matched and equally willing to fight in crowded urban areas. Neither side appears to have a strategy beyond fighting a brutal war of attrition.
“The humanitarian situation in and around Sudan is tragic — there are food, water and fuel shortages, limited access to transport, communications and electricity, and sky-rocketing prices of basic items,” Raouf Mazou of the U.N. Human Rights Commission (UNHCR) said last week.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of an impending humanitarian catastrophe on Monday, especially if both sides continue to plunder medical facilities and humanitarian aid.
“The fighting needs to stop — and to stop now — before more people die and this conflict explodes into an all-out war that could affect the region for years to come. All parties must put the interests of the Sudanese people first and that means peace, a return to civilian rule, allowing for the development of the country,” said Guterres.
“Aid must be allowed into Sudan, and we need secure and immediate access to be able to distribute it to people who need it most. Civilians and civilian infrastructure must be protected. And humanitarian workers and their assets must be respected,” Guterres said.
The U.N. estimated on Monday that 61 percent of healthcare facilities in Khartoum are closed entirely, and only 16 percent are conducting normal operations. UNICEF said at least 190 children have been killed in the fighting, plus another 1,700 injured.
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