Dear Deeply Readers,

Welcome to the archives of News Deeply’s Women & Girls Hub. While we paused regular publication of the site on January 22, 2018, and transitioned our coverage to Women’s Advancement Deeply, we are happy to serve as an ongoing public resource on the Arctic. We hope you’ll enjoy the reporting and analysis that was produced by our dedicated community of editors contributors.

We continue to produce events and special projects while we explore where the on-site journalism goes next. If you’d like to reach us with feedback or ideas for collaboration you can do so at [email protected].

Deeply Talks: Caring for Rohingya Women and Girls

Women & Girls speaks with Dr. Hassan Abdi of UNFPA and journalist Katie Arnold about how best to provide sexual and reproductive healthcare to Rohingya women and girls amid one of the world’s most desperate humanitarian crises.

Written by Jihii Jolly, Megan Clement Published on Read time Approx. 1 minutes
A Rohingya migrant woman holds a child next to makeshift shelters at the Thankhali refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar earlier this month. Ed Jones/AFP via Getty Images

Since August 2017, more than 625,000 members of the Rohingya minority have been driven from their homes in Myanmar’s Rakhine State into refugee camps in southern Bangladesh.

The majority of these refugees are women and girls, who are often fleeing horrific sexual violence. Many arrive in the camps without even a change of clothes, but, like women and girls everywhere, they need access to menstrual hygiene products, contraception and maternal health services. And the threat of violence does not disappear when they leave Myanmar. Women and girls remain at risk of rape and assault in the overcrowded camps of Cox’s Bazar.

In this episode of Deeply Talks, Dr. Hassan Abdi, a UNFPA sexual and reproductive health specialist based in Cox’s Bazar, and journalist Katie Arnold, who has reported on the crisis for Women & Girls, discuss the challenges of providing sexual and reproductive healthcare to women and girls during the Rohingya crisis.

“Midwives are the true heroes on the ground,” Abdi says. “Working around the clock to meet the needs of pregnant women, the new mothers and the newborns.”

“Supporting so many women needing care and support under such challenging and resource-limited conditions is personally difficult for them. They are human too, and they are affected by the suffering they witness.”

Both Abdi and Arnold expressed concern for the year ahead, as the details remain unclear on whether a memorandum of understanding signed between Myanmar and Bangladesh to allow for the return of Rohingya refugees to Rakhine State will actually work, and as the UNFPA faces an $8.3 million funding gap.

“Almost all humanitarian organizations have struggled to raise enough money to meet the current needs of the Rohingya population, let alone their needs over a protracted period of time,” Arnold said.

Deeply Talks is a regular feature, bringing together our network of readers and expert contributors to examine the latest developments on issues affecting women and girls in the developing world. To join future Deeply Talks, make sure you are signed up to the Women & Girls newsletter.

 

 

Suggest your story or issue.

Send

Share Your Story.

Have a story idea? Interested in adding your voice to our growing community?

Learn more