The catastrophic flash flooding that ensued on 11 April in the eThekwini region in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal Province has left 40,000 people homeless and many are sheltering in community-based schools, churches and halls without food, cookware, mattresses, blankets, clothes and basic hygiene products. South Africa, 2022. © Sandile Ndlovu
The city remains in crisis 10 days after the storm, and it is now primarily a crisis of water and sanitation provision – to hospitals, clinics and communities. Failure to get this right could spell a deepening health crisis, characterized by water-borne disease. We have been supporting four of the shelters since the Easter weekend, helping to meet the immediate needs, of residents, which include food, water, cookware, blankets, mattresses and other basic items.”Dr Mani Thandrayen, Medical Team Leader
Doctors Without Borders has distributed food and blankets, mattresses, cookware and basic hygiene products for 500 people and has provided kitchen appliances at community shelters.
To guard against disease outbreak in the aftermath of the floods, Doctors Without Borders has installed 25 portable toilets at three shelters, and provided four water tanks for potable water storage.
Dozens of health facilities and vulnerable communities were left without clean drinking water and sanitation after flash floods tore through hilly eThekwini region in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal Province on the night of 11 April. South Africa, 2022. © MSF
During the Doctors Without Borders team’s first community visits it was apparent that many traumatized people were reeling from loss of family members and their homes and are in need of counselling. Registered counsellors working for Doctors Without Borders, as well as several Doctors Without Borders doctors and nurses, have since joined mobile health clinics under the management of the provincial and municipality health departments. In the coming days these teams will aim to bring health services to all shelters across the municipality.
“We are living a daily tragedy – I am so overwhelmed I struggle to recall my own cellphone number,” says Nozipho Sithole, a resident of Ntuzuma community who lost her own home and is now helping to manage the shelter at Ntuzuma Community Hall.
Doctors Without Borders medical staff including doctors, nurses and registered counsellors have joined mobile health clinics under the management of the provincial and municipality health departments. South Africa, 2022. © MSF
Doctors Without Borders will continue providing punctual support to clinics and shelters needing water and sanitation, and is working with the authorities to explore the possibility of water treatment solutions and the drilling of community boreholes.
Doctors Without Borders has had a long presence in South Africa and has run many projects focusing on HIV/TB, Sexual Gender Based Violence and COVID-19. In KwaZulu-Natal, Doctors Without Borders currently runs a TB project in Eshowe. The organisation has also on several occasions stepped in to assist in the province during emergencies. During the week of unrest in KZN and Gauteng in July 2021, Doctors Without Borders provided emergency support to communities and health facilities affected by the violence, while during the peak of COVID-19, the organisation provided oxygen concentrators on loan to a local hospital in Pietermaritzburg to ensure that severe COVID-19 patients were supported.
