Sudan Photo Gallery Index
Because of Sudan's 19 years of civil war, the health status of the southern Sudanese
people is among the poorest globally. Extremely poor nutrition has exacerbated
the disease epidemics, including malaria, diarrhea and respiratory infections,
resulting in very high child deaths. USAID has put over one billion dollars in
humanitarian assistance into Sudan since 1989. Beginning in 1998, development
assistance has also been provided in southern Sudan. The White House, USAID Administrator
Andrew Natsios, U.S. Special Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan, and Former Senator
John Danforth, special envoy to Sudan, have worked tirelessly with the Government
of Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement to negotiate a comprehensive
framework agreement for peace and provide humanitarian and transformational development
assistance.
On May 10th, Dr. E. Anne Peterson, Assistant Administrator for Global Health,
along with Allan Reed, the USAID representative to Sudan, and a small team traveled
to
southern
Sudan to review health programs and announce USAID’s new five-year $34
million Health Transformation Program for Eastern and Western Equatorial, Upper
Nile, Southern Blue Nile, Bahr el Ghazal, and the Nuba Mountain regions. This
program will be carried out with the people of Sudan, the U.S. Centers for Disease
Control
and Boston-based John Snow International’s Research & Training Institute,
Inc. a public health private voluntary organization. The program aims to improve
health, save lives, and create a better future for children, mothers and families
in southern Sudan. Health activities under this program will complement health
inputs from USAID’s Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA) to promote
the transition from relief to development.
According to the United Nations (UN), the crisis in the western Sudanese region
of Darfur is currently the worst humanitarian and human rights catastrophe in
the world. The UN has estimated that, out of a pre-conflict population in Darfur
of 6.5 million, approximately one million people have been internally displaced
within Sudan and more than 120,000 people have fled across the border into neighboring
Chad. Insecurity in the Eastern Equatoria region
of southern Sudan has also increased due to the depredations of the Lord’s
Resistance Army (LRA), a Ugandan terrorist group supported by elements of the
GOS that has historically used southern Sudan as a base from which to launch
attacks against Ugandan civilians and military forces.
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