New report warns Rohingya moms and babies in camps at risk

A leading aid agency is warning that around 75 percent Rohingya babies are born in unsafe and unhygienic makeshift shelters. This means hundreds of mothers and their newborns in the refugee camps may die this year if they are denied of proper maternal healthcare.

By Vatican News

A new report drawn up by the international charity, Save the Children, says hundreds of mothers and babies in camps for Rohingya refugees could die this year of entirely preventable causes, if mothers do not get proper maternal healthcare.

The data gathered by the charity’s Primary Health Care Centre from July 2018 to April 2019, shows that of the expected 400 births in a community of some 20,000 people, only 119 babies were safely delivered in properly-equipped health facilities, with the remaining births taking place in bamboo shelters and makeshift homes.

These are conditions, the report points out, that put the lives of both mother and baby at great risk.

Save the Children’s assessment comes as the United Nations released new data from the Rohingya camps, which estimates that for every 100,000 live births, 179 mothers die from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth.

That’s almost two and half times higher than the worldwide target for maternal mortality of under 70 per 100,000 live births.

The reports also found that some families in the refugee camps do not seek service from any healthcare centres as they fear sterilisation or infanticide that they allegedly faced in Myanmar.

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