CORONAVIRUS CRISIS

Double protection: UNHCR’s assistance comes with information about COVID-19

UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, stays and delivers despite the global health crisis. While the Agency and its partners had to reduce their movements across Sudan and to interrupt some important activities for refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs), many others continued - in a different way.

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HIGHLIGHTS

Food and blanket distributions to refugees and IDPs are combined with COVID-19 info.

Contingency plan helps agencies and refugee communities prepare for day X – when COVID-19 might hit a camp.

Brand new ambulances handed over by UNHCR to the health authorities for pregnant women, malnourished children and other emergencies.

MORE FOOD, LESS RISK

Given the global health crisis, UNHCR and partners continue their work in a different way. In East Sudan, UNHCR, together with WFP stayed and delivered food vouchers to refugees in the Shagarab refugee camps. To avoid unnecessary crowds, the food distribution was given for two months instead of one, thus eliminating one gathering and the potential exposure of refugees to an infection. The distribution took place over a period of eight days and aimed at reaching some 44,800 men, women and children.

In West Darfur, the Sudanese Red Crescent Society (SRCS), too, resumed the distribution of non-food-items (NFI) such as blankets for UNHCR to IDPs in a different way. The challenge of physical distancing was turned into an opportunity. Every IDP family received information about how to protect themselves against the virus before receiving blankets, jerry cans, sleeping mats, plastic sheets and kitchen sets. To ensure physical distance,
UNHCR used nearly empty Gathering Points of IDPs such as schools in El Geneina from which IDPs had recently returned to the Krinding camps.

In addition, the number of families called for the distribution at a time was reduced by 50 per cent. SRCS and UNHCR personnel kept the usual distance from the beneficiaries to protect them from any potential spread. Since January, nearly 50,000 IDPs received NFI support.