Health Service Disruptions in Helmand Reduce Access to Medicines and Doctors

Local sources in Helmand say health services in the province’s urban and rural areas have been disrupted in recent months, significantly reducing residents’ access to medicine and medical care.

According to these sources, the suspension of global aid in the health sector has weakened health centres, and medicine is now no longer being distributed to people in many hospitals. They told the 8am Daily on Wednesday, 4 September, that the situation has also affected people’s access to basic health services.

Based on information from the sources, in the past, with support from international aid organisations, health workers would travel to different areas with medical equipment and provide daily health services, but that process has now stopped.

Local residents say that in areas where there is no nearby health centre, both communicable and non-communicable diseases have increased, and people have no place to raise their requests and problems.

A resident of Sangin district said: “Every week health workers used to come to our village and help people with health care, but now they are gone, and there is no hospital nearby either.”

A resident of Nad Ali district also said that illness has spread throughout their village, but there is neither a health centre available nor doctors visiting the area.

Helmand is one of Afghanistan’s southern provinces, and many of its villages are far from treatment centres, a situation that makes access to basic care even more difficult if mobile health services are reduced.