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Photo: Barbra Keeler/the IRC

“The patients who come here are totally dependent on the services this hospital gives them,” Mohamed Yuusuf, doctor at IRC-run South Galkacyo Hospital in Somalia explains.

After decades of conflict over 2 million Somalis have been forced to flee their homes. While many fled to Kenya and Ethiopia, over 1.1 million people sought safety within their country. As a result, much of the nation’s infrastructure has been stretched to breaking point and in the Mudug region of central Somalia, home to South Galkacyo Hospital, decades of war and unrest have left healthcare facilities underfunded, and often at risk of closure.

“Those who deliver their babies in the village don’t get proper doctors and they don’t receive proper care,” Cibaado Abshir Rooble explains. To give birth she travelled over 100 kilometres from Ceelguua to reach the South Galkacyo Hospital, which has been supported by the IRC since August 2013. “They sent me to the maternity department at South Galkacyo to get delivery care. When I was fine, they discharged me,” she adds.

The hospital is the largest in the region and offers specialist maternity and antenatal care, making it a vital lifeline for women from both the internally displaced population and the local host community. Like Cibaado, many women travel long distances to reach the hospital with some coming from beyond the region and across the Ethiopia border.

“I came to the hospital because I was feeling pain and I needed to be treated. We don’t have any other hospital,” pregnant mother-of-three, Anab Said Mohamed, explains.

 

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Critical support

In 2015 the hospital provided over 76,000 patients with care free-of-charge, delivering a total of 1,724 healthy babies. The maternal mortality for the hospital remains significantly low with no maternal deaths having been reported in 2015.

In addition to maternity services, the hospital also provides the community with a wide range of other medical treatments. “The hospital receives any patient who is sick,” Mohamed says. This includes an emergency department and a specialist department to treat malnourished children, especially important as Somalia has one of the world’s most acute rates of child malnutrition and anemia. “If they miss this hospital they will not have another chance to have these medical services,” Omar Ahmed, an Operating Theatre Nurse at the hospital, explains. For now, the IRC is able to continue to support South Galkacyo Hospital to serve this vulnerable population due to ongoing funding from the European Commission's Humanitarian aid and Civil Protection department (ECHO).

With support from the European Commission's Humanitarian aid and Civil Protection department (ECHO), the IRC is working to support both internally displaced people and the local host community with access to healthcare, protection for women and young girls, livelihoods opportunities, as well as safe water, sanitation and hygiene across the Banadir, Mudug, Nugaal, and Bari Regions of Somalia.