Wings for medical evacuations in Chad
WFP manned UNHAS service delivers in Chad
Chad is a vast country with very limited health facilities and services. Distances are considerable, road infrastructure is scarce and deficient, and many regions are completely inaccessible during the rainy season (June to September).
In the absence of local commercial airlines approved for United Nations staff travel, the United Nations Humanitarian Aviation Service (UNHAS), constitutes an essential part of humanitarian operations, providing access to vulnerable populations in the remotest parts of the country. Beneficiary sites are often located far away from cities and medical facilities.
In this context, only UNHAS can transport people in urgent need of medical treatment or medication from these isolated areas to clinics in N’Djamena or elsewhere. In 2018, UNHAS performed some 94 life-saving medical evacuations of humanitarian workers and beneficiaries in critical health condition.
In September, the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) requested the evacuation of a 2-year-old child from Goz Beida to Ndjamena, which is around 900 km away. The child was extremely weak and a doctor had to accompany her on the trip. UNHAS used two different aircraft to fly to N’Djamena, with a stop-over in Abeche. The doctor also advised pilots on safety measures during the flights. Thanks to this coordinated action between agencies, this child recovered and was able to return home in good health.
Only one month later in October, UNHAS performed another life-saving flight for a mother and her newborn twin babies from Am Djarass to N’Djamena. The city of Am Djarass is some 1,200 km east of Ndjamena on the border with Sudan. The patient, a 25-year-old female refugee, had pre-eclampsia while pregnant, which also affected the newborns. Women who have the disorder experience high blood pressure and either large amounts of protein in the urine or other organ dysfunction.
The request for a medical evacuation came from UNHCR and International Rescue Committee (IRC). UNHAS response time was only 12 hours. To accommodate this emergency evacuation, UNHAS revised its weekly flying schedule and canceled its regular connection to Haraze that day. The eight affected passengers were able to fly the next day.
UNHAS enables the humanitarian community in Chad to reach the furthest behind first, whether it is for the medical evacuation of humanitarian aid workers or beneficiaries, or to provide life-saving assistance to vulnerable populations throughout the country. In 2018, UNHAS also performed two security evacuations and two body evacuations.
Managed by the World Food Programme (WFP) and funded by Canada, the European Commission’s European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO), Luxembourg, the Republic of Korea, Sweden, the United Nation’s Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), and the United States (USAID-Food for Peace), UNHAS enables humanitarian workers to access in hard-to-reach areas in Chad.
