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CONTENTS

Home (Key Points)

Chapter 1: Crises Pose Major Challenges for Reproductive Health Care

Box: Millions Need Care in Crises
Table 1. Persons of Concern to the UNHCR, January 1, 2005, by Region and by Status
Table 2. Estimates of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), by Region, January 1, 2005
Table 3. Natural Disasters and People Affected, January 2004 to September 2005

Box: Reducing Violence Against Women: Health Care Providers Can Help

Box: International Relief Agencies Provide Reproductive Health Care

Box: What To Do First in a Crisis

Chapter 2: Reproductive Health Care Providers Can Help
Table 4. Key Resources for Reproductive Health Care in Crisis Situations
Web Table 1. Additional Key Resources for Reproductive Health Care in Crisis Situations

Box: Minimum Initial Service Package Guides Crisis Care

Organizations with Web-Based Information on Reproductive Health Care in Crisis Situations

Bibliography

Credits

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What To Do First in a Crisis

Crises often strike with little or no warning. What can you, as a reproductive health care provider, do immediately to begin to help? Doris Bartel, a senior reproductive health expert with the RHRC Consortium, suggests the following:

  • Immediately approach someone working for a UN organization and ask which organizations and/or individuals are coordinating and implementing reproductive health care or the Minimum Initial Service Package (MISP). Offer your services and give your qualifications. If you represent your hospital or clinic, provide its roster of staff names and qualifications and the health services it can offer.

  • If you or your clinic/hospital has the skills and equipment to provide any component of the MISP, start doing so immediately.

  • Ask a UNFPA, UNICEF, or international NGO representative responding to the crisis to order supplies for you according to how many people you think you can serve. Also ask that they include your clinic in distribution of supplies.

  • Go to the reproductive health care coordination meetings and say what you observe about the crisis and what you are doing in response. If no agency is arranging coordination meetings, arrange one yourself and determine who is doing what to carry out the actions in the MISP. Ask for volunteers to fill the gaps.

  • If there are many displaced people, talk to the relief workers organizing shelter, water, latrines, and food. If you know how to set up water pumps and latrines, let them know, and set them up in well-lit places.

EC/ECHO South Asia Office

Immediate care is always the top priority in crisis situations. In Tamil Nadu, India, relief personnel treat survivors of the 2004 tsunami. (Photo Credit: EC/ECHO South Asia Office)

  • Work with the people distributing food rations to make sure that women are equally represented on distribution committees.

  • Make sure that sanitary supplies (cloth pieces or small towels) as well as clean delivery kits are distributed with food rations.

  • If you notice that vulnerable groups such as children are being neglected by the food distribution system, make this known to the UN representative in charge of food distribution.

  • Do not forget to get enough rest and nutrition. Taking care of yourself will help you take care of others as well

Source: Bartel 2005 (5)


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