{"id":361952,"date":"2011-04-02T18:47:54","date_gmt":"2011-04-02T18:47:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/04\/02\/cote-divoire-if-youre-out-on-the-streets-youre-a-target\/"},"modified":"2011-04-02T18:47:54","modified_gmt":"2011-04-02T18:47:54","slug":"cote-divoire-if-youre-out-on-the-streets-youre-a-target","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/02\/cote-divoire-if-youre-out-on-the-streets-youre-a-target\/","title":{"rendered":"Cote d’Ivoire: ‘If You’re Out on the Streets, You’re a Target’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\nMedecins Sans Frontieres<\/a> (Geneva)\n<\/p>\n

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2 April 2011<\/p>\n

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Abidjan \u2014 Henry Gray <\/strong>is a field coordinator with Doctors Without Borders\/M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF) in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. He gave this report by phone while in lock-down due to security issues.??It\u2019s quite a hairy situation here at the moment. We\u2019re hearing constant gunfire along with the occasional heavy detonation, and that\u2019s been going on for a few days now. We had been moving around, visiting clinics and helping patients up until a few days ago. But the situation on the streets has deteriorated to such an extent that it\u2019s just become too dangerous to go outside.<\/em><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot of pillaging and looting going on, and if you\u2019re out on the streets, you\u2019re basically a target. Armed gangs are out on the street and there is a real atmosphere of fear out in the community, particularly in the poorer areas. It\u2019s weird, because Abidjan is actually a really nice city with well-maintained roads and nice bridges and big buildings. If you just landed here you could imagine you were in Australia or somewhere. But it\u2019s not a great atmosphere here at the moment.<\/p>\n

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There are a lot of people shooting each other, but what we\u2019re finding is that the number of people shooting each other is a fraction of the population of the city. There are five million people in this city, and even though 20 percent of the population has fled, there are still a huge number of people here, most of whom now have no access to health care. It\u2019s too dangerous to move to get to a clinic or hospital, and even if you get there, most of the doctors and nurses won\u2019t have been able to get there.<\/p>\n

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We heard about a woman in one area just the other day who had complications when she was giving birth, but the people attending to her couldn\u2019t do anything. The army had blocked the bridges so they couldn\u2019t get to a hospital in the south, and there was too much fighting going on, anyway. You get in a car to try and take somebody to a hospital and, more likely than not, you won\u2019t be coming back. So it\u2019s a bad situation, and the population is suffering because they can\u2019t access basic medical care.<\/p>\n

Despite that, we have been able to treat some people. We had a team who delivered a baby this morning just down the road, which went well. And earlier on we had a small girl, nine or 10 years old, who came in with severe malaria and a fever that was over 40 degrees. We were able to treat her successfully and she\u2019s fine now. Chronic cases are coming on; we can\u2019t move them anywhere, but we can treat them here.<\/p>\n

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We\u2019ve been in lock-down here at the office for 24 hours. The other MSF teams in the city are also finding it difficult to move. But one group is in Abobo Sud Hospital on the other side of the city\u2014this is the only hospital still working in that area of over one million residents. They saw 60 patients in the emergency department yesterday alone\u201450 of whom had gunshot wounds.<\/p>\n

There are about seven expats here with me and about 15 Ivorian staff. Most of the staff stayed here in the office with us last night, as it wasn\u2019t safe to move.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re not actually shooting at us, but whenever there\u2019s a particularly long burst of gunfire going on we all find ourselves in the middle corridor saying “Fancy seeing you here”. But the team is in great shape and the morale is high.<\/p>\n

The national staff are talking to their families on the phone and that\u2019s basically how we\u2019re getting our information about what is going on in different areas. They\u2019re our eyes and ears, and we rely on them to find out where the fighting is, which areas are calm, and who is on the move.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s difficult to say what\u2019s going to happen in the next few days, but we hope we\u2019ll be able to get to the people who need our help. We\u2019re planning to open up a number of emergency posts throughout the city to stabilize patients who have been hit by bullets, and also for people who need emergency care. There are a lot of people out there who need our help.<\/p>\n

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Go here to see the original:
\nCote d’Ivoire: ‘If You’re Out on the Streets, You’re a Target’<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Medecins Sans Frontieres (Geneva) 2 April 2011 Abidjan \u2014 Henry Gray is a field coordinator with Doctors Without Borders\/M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF) in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. He gave this report by phone while in lock-down due to security issues.??It\u2019s quite a hairy situation here at the moment. We\u2019re hearing constant gunfire along with the occasional heavy detonation, and that\u2019s been going on for a few days now<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-361952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\nCote d'Ivoire: 'If You're Out on the Streets, You're a Target' - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/02\/cote-divoire-if-youre-out-on-the-streets-youre-a-target\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Cote d'Ivoire: 'If You're Out on the Streets, You're a Target' - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Medecins Sans Frontieres (Geneva) 2 April 2011 Abidjan \u2014 Henry Gray is a field coordinator with Doctors Without Borders\/M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF) in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. 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