Attachments
A. SITUATION ANALYSIS
Since 25 August 2017, 655,000 people4 , the majority of whom are women and children, have fled violence in Rakhine state, Myanmar and have crossed the border to seek shelter in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. The newly displaced people (People from Rakhine) add to the 212,538 people who had already fled from Rakhine state, Myanmar to Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh in successive displacement flows - most recently in October 2016. In total, there are 832,112 People from Rakhine in Cox’s Bazar.
A majority of the People from Rakhine are sheltering in makeshift and spontaneous settlements – often under plastic sheeting or tarpaulin – and in mostly terrible and overcrowded conditions. Many of the newly arrivals have settled in previously uninhabited areas (field or forest land) with no pre-existing infrastructure or services and in one of the poorest and most-disaster prone regions of the country. Many of the displaced people are entirely dependent on humanitarian assistance for survival. The greatest and most urgent needs for the displaced people have been identified include access to shelter; clean water, sanitation and hygiene services; medical care; food and nutrition and protection.
The Government of Bangladesh’s Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner (RRRC) with the support of the UNHCR has conducted a family counting exercise.5 Early November saw completion of the first phase, during which more than 500,000 displaced people from Myanmar were counted.6 The data revealed that one in every three families have an easily identifiable vulnerability. As many as 14 per cent are single mothers. Others are struggling with serious health problems or disabilities. There is also a high proportion of children which is 54.9 per cent of the total population.
As the situation has progressed, the occurrence of different diseases has been reported. From 8 November to 17 December 2017, 1,607 suspected cases of diphtheria were reported. Key challenges associated with the response to the diphtheria outbreak include low vaccination coverage amongst the displaced population; limited treatment capacity; insufficient global supply of diphtheria anti-toxins, and necessary isolation, infection prevention and control procedures which require additional resources. A Diphtheria Task Force has been established, led by the Bangladesh Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and WHO. Response to the cases of diphtheria is being provided by different organizations including the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement.
The scale and speed of the displacement and the intense vulnerability of those displaced has created one of the most urgent, critical, challenging and complex humanitarian crises in the Asia Pacific region in decades.
On 11 October 2017, IFRC categorized the situation as crisis level ‘Red’ according to the IFRC Emergency Response Framework, indicating that the emergency is of a scale and complexity that demands an organisation-wide priority for the IFRC Secretariat at all levels.
BDRCS is leading the Population Movement Operation (PMO) with the support of IFRC, ICRC and Partner National Societies (PNSs). IFRC supported programmes are focused in Cox’s Bazar district in Mainnerghona7 , Hakim Para, Burma Para and Shamlapur. In two locations, Hakim Para and Mainnerghona, BDRCS with the support of IFRC has allocated resources for a temporary site liaison function. The strategy to work in focused locations enables the greater optimisation of resources and minimizes logistics, administration and coordination challenges. The strategy also increases the visibility of the Red Cross Red Crescent actions within the targeted communities.