Thursday, January 13, 2022
Access blocked for months
WHO chief: nowhere is there “hell like in Tigray”
The drugs are running out, there is hardly any food – but Ethiopia continues to seal off the conflict region of Tigray. “The situation is desperate,” says WHO chief Tedros. Even in the worst times of conflict in Syria or Yemen, the World Health Organization was allowed to deliver life-saving material.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has been fighting in vain for access to the conflict region of Tigray in northern Ethiopia for more than six months. WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who himself comes from Tigray, described the situation as catastrophic. “Nowhere in the world are we witnessing a hell as in Tigray,” he said in Geneva. “The situation is desperate.”
Even in the worst times of conflict in Syria or Yemen, the WHO had access to at least provide life-saving material. In Ethiopia, the WHO tried at all levels to persuade the government of Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to allow medicine to be delivered to the region, but to no avail. “It is terrible and inconceivable that a government could deny its own people food, medicine and everything else to survive for more than a year,” said Tedros. “This has to stop.”
The seven million people in Tigray have little to eat. Tedros reported on the call for help from a doctor who had turned to the WHO. He has not received any new medication for diabetics since June 2021. In his distress, he began to administer expired drugs in September. Even these were only enough for a few days. Infusion solution was also run out, so that patients now only get one drop of water.
The military conflict began a good year ago when Abiy began to oust the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which was in power in Tigray. The TPLF dominated Ethiopia for a good 25 years until Abiy came to power in 2018. Many people in Tigray feel that they are not represented by the central government and are demanding more autonomy. Both parties to the conflict are accused of atrocities.