ALEPPO, Syria (North Press) – After ten days of suffering, the three children of the 30-year-old Fatima Ali recovered from chickenpox, but symptoms are still covering faces and bodies of two other children of her.
Ali, a mother of five, gives drugs to her infected children regularly, anoints rashes with special cream, and gives them antipyretics.
The IDP from Afrin countryside residing in Sardam Camp in the northern countryside of Aleppo governorate stays awake all night watching her children, who cannot sleep, feeling pain and exhausted in addition suffering from fever and itching.
Chickenpox is a highly contagious disease caused by the varicella-zoster virus. It can cause itchy rash with small, fluid-filled blisters. The rash first appears on the chest, back, and face, and then spreads over the entire body.
Symptoms include fever, loss of appetite, headache, tiredness and a general feeling of being unwell and vomiting. The infection appears 10 to 21 days after exposure to the virus and usually lasts about 10 days
The infection rapidly spreads among children and women in camps in light of a severe shortage of drugs in medical centers of the Kurdish Red Crescent and the lack of support by international organizations.
Ali was forced to buy drugs (ointment, antiviral syrup, antibiotic syrup and antipyretics) for her infected children at about 35.000 Syrian pounds (SYP, about $10) since they are not available in the medical center in the camp or in Avrin Hospital in the village of Fafin.
Increasing infections
IDPs from Afrin say that the reason after the increasing infections is that tents are pitched very close to each other amidst the poor medical services provided to the IDPs.
In 2018, Turkish forces launched a military operation named Olive Branch against the city of Afrin and its countryside, north Syria, with support of the Turkish-backed Syrian armed opposition factions, known as the Syrian National Army (SNA).
As a result, 300.000 original inhabitants were forced to flee their areas. Some of them were sheltered in the camps of al-Awda, Afrin, Barkhodan, Sardam and Shahba in the northern countryside of Aleppo governorate.
Part of them are residing in 42 villages and towns in the same area, and others resorted to areas in northeast Syria such as Qamishli, Kobani, Derik and Hasakah.
Since early May 24, chickenpox infections were recorded in Sardam Camp, ten in Barkhodan Camp, and three in the village of al-Ahdath, according to a statistic by the Kurdish Red Crescent operating in the region.
Between five and six cases are recorded on a daily basis due to rapid person-to-person transmission, according to the organization’s statistic.
Sakina Arabo, a member of the Kurdish Red Crescent in Sardam Camp, said that camps are witnessing increasing chickenpox infections.
“Those infected with chickenpox need antipyretics, immune-boosts and vitamins, and these types are not available here,” Arabo stressed.
Unavailable drugs
Arabo explained that due to the lack of the needed drugs in the organization’s points and the dire economic condition, the IDPs suffer more.
She noted that their job becomes harder “especially when patients visit us, and we cannot help them… most of the patients are IDPs.”
She appealed to the relevant international organizations to support the IDPs amidst warnings of increasing infections in the coming period.
The organization has seven medical points in the region that provide emergency medical services along with the Avrin Hospital, which is the only center to provide medical services for free.
Those camps receive poor or almost no support by the international relief and health organizations.
The IDPs are already suffering from lack of job opportunities under severe restrictions that the Syrian government checkpoints periodically impose.
Moreover, the government successively prevents the entry of medical supplies to the region, leading to a shortage of the medicines and hike in their prices.
Due to her economic hardship, Almaz Hussein, an IDP from the countryside of Afrin residing in Sardam Camp, could not buy drugs for her children, who are infected with chickenpox.
“I visited the clinic where they prescribed ointment for him, and they stressed the need to buy drugs, but I could not,” said Hussein, a mother of five.
As a result, she resorted to cold compresses to control high temperature.
Mawlida Ali, an IDP from Afrin also residing in the same camp, complains about the hike in the medicines’ prices in light of the prevalence of the infection in the camp.
“Our condition is really bad in light of the high cost,” she said.
Mawlida and other IDPs in the camp wish that they can return to their areas in Afrin where they can live healthy and safe life.