Stranded Afghans suffering from scurvy

The majority of Afghan refugees treated recently while stranded on flood plains on the Tajik-Afghan border have symptoms of anaemia and scurvy - a vitamin C deficiency, the British NGO Merlin confirmed on Monday.

“Our immediate concern is the lack of nutrition these people are getting,” Merlin’s country director for Tajikistan, Paul Handley, told IRIN.

Handley said the findings were made after a Merlin medical team treated 279 Afghans in early July.

Handley explained that the immediate need was to get appropriate food out to the flood plains on the Pyandzh river, and particularly to children.

“They are only getting wheat and rice, and they are not eating fruit and vegetables,” he added. There is no agriculture, nor are there any edible plants within their reach.

An estimated 12,000 Afghans fled their homeland to seek shelter on the flood plains, and they have been there for around nine months. Although WFP has been donating food aid, the refugees have had little access to basic provisions, and are now in desperate need of food and medical supplies.

Most of the refugees are living in an area of the flood plains near the front line between the Taliban and Northern Alliance forces, but some have moved to a smaller area up-river to flee mainland shelling.

Many of them are housed in makeshift shelters made of reeds near the river banks, and with temperatures soaring, aid workers are concerned that the plains could become a breeding ground for diseases.

“We fear that [the likelihood of] an outbreak of malaria and diarrhoea could increase,” Handley said.

The British NGO has already sent in half a million vitamin C tablets to help reduce cases of scurvy, but Handley has appealed for more aid from the international community. He warned that the refugees had already braved one winter, and were set to stay for another.

“We need to remind people that these Afghans are still stuck there and they need help,” he added.