‘Crawling around between one of the endless rows of tents’
REPORTER
Laura Westendorp
Laura Westendorp works for UNICEF in the Netherlands and is visiting South Sudan. The armed conflict in South Sudan has huge consequences. More than a million people are refugees and tens of thousands of acutely underfed children in South Sudan are at great risk of dying if they are not treated quickly. UNICEF is doing everything possible to help them.
Laura Westendorp works for UNICEF in the Netherlands and is visiting South Sudan. Tens of thousands acutely underfed children in this country are at great risk of dying if they are not treated quickly. From the refugee camp, Laura is keeping a blog. A fragment.
He was born a week ago. A tiny baby lays next to mother Rosie on a camp bed in the only birthing clinic in camp Tomping in Juba. The Caesarean section by which the boy was brought into the world was carried out in a sandy tent, located behind the tent which is set up for patients staying longer. Births take place here constantly. With approximately 14,000 residents, more capacity is actually needed, but in any case, the complicated cases can get help here.
The little boy yawns, warmly wrapped in a ragged bodysuit and a wrinkled cloth. I think of my own children at that age, lying in a spotless cradle, a beautiful baby buggy ready. And don’t forget the baby gym to stimulate development from the first moment on.
This boy will crawl around between one of the endless rows of tents, built of corrugated iron, canvas and whatever building materials were at hand. Here and there stands a threadbare dome tent. Sometimes there are mats on the trampled ground, a few people own a bed or a chair. At the moment I walk around, it is dry, but that morning it rained heavily and some of the tents are flooded.
