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SUDAN: CLEAN WATER ESSENTIAL FOR SURVIVAL: Water-borne disease can be as deadly as famine. "It's the second biggest problem, the one people mention after the shortage of food," says ICRC water and sanitation engineer Marie Francoise Timmermans.
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SUDAN CLEAN WATER ESSENTIAL FOR SURVIVAL
Water-borne disease can be as deadly as famine. "It's the second biggest problem, the one people mention after the shortage of food," says ICRC water and sanitation engineer Marie Francoise Timmermans. "A lot of the people's water sources here have been sabotaged during the fighting, and unless something is done to improve their access to drinking water, there is going to be a lot of disease. We are already seeing many cases of worms, especially in young children, as well as diarrhoea and dysentery".
In the southern Sudanese town of Yirol, for example, there used to be 45 open wells and pump-equipped bore holes. When ICRC delegates arrived there recently, there was one single bore hole for an estimated population of 7,000. "Our plan is to provide at least one source of clean water for every thousand residents," says Timmermans. "That is, seven for a town like Yirol."
When the conflict strikes towns like Yirol, pumps are destroyed and bore holes are clogged with rocks and chunks of cement. Human corpses have even been thrown into open wells to contaminate them. Water and sanitation work is an absolute necessity since clean drinking water is indispensable to the recovery of famine victims even when they have received sufficient food.
So far in Yirol, the ICRC's engineers have unclogged two bore holes, drilled a third and are working on two others. One well near the market in the centre of town is being cleaned and another will be repaired once debris have been removed and chlorine added to purify the water. Fifty dry latrines are also being set up to improve sanitation and reduce the risk of disease.
After they have completed the initial phase in Yirol, water and sanitation crews will begin a series of projects in surrounding communities before moving further to the south-east in coming months.
In Tonj, another SPLA-controlled town in southern Sudan, the ICRC is about to drill three bore holes in the centre of town and repair the pump for a fourth. This work should be completed in the next few weeks. Many sources of water are situated in premises that are closed in the evenings, thus depriving the population of round-the-clock access to clean water. Once this is remedied, the ICRC team in Tonj will install pumps and rehabilitate three other bore holes in smaller communities in that region.
ICRC water and sanitation teams are also working in the government-held town of Wau and are planning operations in other areas.
Further information: Bernard Barrett, ICRC Khartoum, tel. ++249 11 476 464 Michael Kleiner, ICRC Geneva, tel. ++41 22 730 22 81
During the weekend of 5 - 6 September 1998, for all information please call the press officer on duty Ruben Ortega, on (mobile) 41 79 217 32 03