World Hand Hygiene Day 2023

Conflict, persecution, poverty, food insecurity and natural disasters—increasingly fueled by climate change—continue to drive migration globally. Yet many wealthy countries are doubling down on hostile policies to prevent people from seeking safety within their borders, thereby subjecting them to a wide range of harms. In a newly-published report MSF focuses on European Union and member state policies that intensify exposure to violence, exploitation, risk of drowning at sea, disease, and lack of access to basic health care and shelter, both within European Union borders and beyond. The Collection linked below presents this report alongside selected publications illustrating the broader context, based on quantitative studies and accounts from MSF patients and medical teams over nearly a decade of operational experience along the European migration route. From violent, squalid detention centers in Libya— where people intercepted by the EU-supported Libyan coast guard are forcibly returned —to perilous Mediterranean crossings in flimsy rubber boats and often abysmal reception centers and camps within the EU, it documents how these policies and practices further harm highly vulnerable people seeking safety and protection.

Diabetes affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide, a large majority of them living in low- and middle-income countries. Yet finding effective strategies, tools and policies for effectively managing this chronic illness—especially amid war, displacement or exclusion from care—is a neglected area of humanitarian medicine. Here we present a cross-section of work on this front by MSF and collaborators. Several studies assess the shift towards community-based, nurse-led models of care in rural settings. Others explore obstacles to diabetes care for war refugees living in camps in Jordan or Lebanon, highlighting how health programs can adapt to their needs. The demonstration that insulin retains potency for 30 days if cooled without refrigeration is opening doors to more patient self-management, as a case study in remote South Sudan shows. At the same time, MSF and others call for regulatory and financing policies that make diabetes medications and supplies cheaper, better adapted to humanitarian settings, and far more available to patients whose lives depend on them.