Now, we are told, the reason so few cases have been reported at the world’s supposedly largest refugee camp in Bangladesh is that the residents fear they will be isolated if found to be infected and are therefore refusing testing.
I know this is likely boring for most of you, but since I started following the warnings of “catastrophe” and “carnage” as the Chinese Virus spread “like wildfire” to camps where “vulnerable” migrants live in close proximity to each other, I’m compelled to give you updates.
Literally for months there have been dire predictions of the impending crisis, that has not yet materialized.
Only one death of an old man so far as I said hereon Wednesday.
Fear stops Rohingya getting tested as virus hits refugee camps
BANGKOK/DHAKA (Reuters) – Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh with symptoms of the novel coronavirus are not coming forward to get tested because they fear being separated from their families and held in isolation, community leaders and aid workers say.
Only one death from the coronavirus has been recorded in the crowded camps in southeast Bangladesh, where some 730,000 Muslim Rohingya fled in 2017 to escape a military crackdown in Buddhist-majority Myanmar.
Yale Economics Professor Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak visited the camp and told Reuters he is sure the disease prevalence is much higher than testing so far indicates. https://faculty.som.yale.edu/mushfiqmobarak/
But aid workers fear the coronavirus may be spreading faster through the world’s largest refugee settlement than the 29 cases confirmed since mid-May would indicate.Only 339 tests have been carried out in the camps, officials said, partly because people were simply not going to health facilities to get checked.
“Camp hospitals are emptyand illegal doctors’ shops are full,” said 23-year-old refugee Mujef Khan, a community organiser, referring to pharmacies in the camps run by refugees where people buy pills to treat themselves.
“Many people are getting sick day by day – in every shelter,” he said.
Three Rohingya leaders interviewed by Reuters said coronavirus symptoms were prevalent in the camps that sprawl out over hills near the border with Myanmar.
The camps are more densely populated than the most crowded cities and sanitation is poor and social distancing impossible. [This will be the ultimate test in my opinion of whether social distancing matters or not!—ed]
While new testing facilities and treatment centres are being built, a surge in cases couldoverwhelm the camps, aid workers said.
I guess if they aren’t bothering to be tested, they aren’t that sick. However, they won’t be able to hide the deaths and so we will then get a better indication if the “tinderbox” has exploded as the media has been predicting literally for months!
I have been writing about the Rohingya for nearly 13 years. You need to know they are being resettled in the United States right now. See my Rohingya Reports categoryto learn more about this Muslim ethnic group.
As I said a couple of days ago, I know you have more important things on your mind, but I did say I would follow closely the long-predicted “carnage” coming to refugee camps where thousands upon thousands of people are packed cheek by jowl in camps like the one at Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh.
The breathless news was reported by several outlets within the last 24 hours. One gets the feeling that the international media can’t wait to report on “catastrophe” befalling the “vulnerable.” (But, if they could only find a way to blame Donald Trump!)
RPT-UPDATE 2-First Rohingya refugee dies from coronavirus in Bangladesh camps
DHAKA, June 2 (Reuters) – An elderly Rohingya refugee has become the first person to die from coronavirus in the world’s largest refugee settlement in Bangladesh, where there are fears the disease could spread fast due to overcrowding.
The 71-year-old man died on May 31 while undergoing treatment at an isolation centre at the camps where over a million Rohingya live, said Bimal Chakma, a senior official of the government’s Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commission.
“Today we got the confirmation that he tested positive for COVID-19,” he told Reuters by telephone.
Note that he died from something prior to being tested for the Chinese virus.
Reuters goes on to report that there are now 29 cases in the camp that houses a million Rohingya Muslims.
I am watching because this is the ultimate test of the importance (or lack of it) of social distancing.
….but it isn’t for lack of searching for it by the mainstream media.
For weeks I have been scouring news stories daily looking for the widespread arrival of COVID-19 in refugee camps around the world where people are living packed together and soap is a scarce commodity.
Several times I’ve wanted to just post the breathless headlines that scream a human tragedy is on the way. “Catastrophe” and “carnage” are the words that appear in many of the articles I’ve read.
But, so far (and I emphasize ‘so far’) the places where you would think the virus should have spread like wildfire are pretty much untouched.
However, this morning I found this headline at US News and figured it was time to report on the refugee ‘catastrophe’ about to explode (or maybe not):
Coronavirus Cases Rise in Refugee Camps
AS THE NUMBER OF coronavirus cases in refugee camps starts to rise around the world, experts are sounding the alarm over the vulnerabilities of displaced people during the pandemic.
There is a paragraph here taking a whack at the US and ICE, then this….
Meanwhile, confirmed coronavirus cases are turning up in refugee camps. In Greece, authorities announced on April 2 that a migrant camp had been quarantined after 23 asylum seekers tested positive for the coronavirus – the first such facility in the country to be hit since the outbreak, according to Reuters.
Bangladesh imposed a lockdown on March 24 after the first case of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, was reported in the refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Reuters reported. The camps at Cox’s Bazar house more than 1 million Rohingya.
A combination of population density, a lack of information and access to basic human services make refugees particularly vulnerable to the spread of the coronavirus, according to Refugees International.
In a country where soap and water is in short supply, as of today the whole country of Bangladesh has only 482 cases.
Chris Boian, a senior communications officer with the U.N. Refugee Agency, the UNHCR, says that there have been “relatively low numbers of suspected or confirmed cases among refugees” overall.
Never letting a good crisis go to waste, here comes the New Yorker yesterday with an interview with ‘moneybags’ Miliband about the International Rescue Committee’s report on the crisis they are sure will unfoldin refugee camps worldwide.
On April 1st, the I.R.C. released a report on how the coronavirus pandemic could affect refugees. Focussing on displaced populations in Syria, Greece, and Bangladesh, the I.R.C. found that refugees will likely face extreme risk when the virus begins to spread. “The rapid spread of covid-19 on the Diamond Princess”—the cruise ship that was quarantined in the port of Yokohama, Japan—“showed how the virus thrives in confined spaces,” Marcus Skinner, a senior policy adviser at I.R.C., wrote, but the conditions of millions of displaced people “are far more cramped and poorly serviced, and the risks are far deadlier.”
I recently spoke by phone with David Miliband, the president and C.E.O. of the I.R.C. He was formerly a Labour Member of Parliament and the United Kingdom’s Foreign Secretary. During our conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, we discussed what can be done to prevent vulnerable populations from contracting the coronavirus, how the I.R.C. is protecting its own staff, and why a pandemic makes international coöperation all the more necessary.
Of course their plan offers no real solutions. They say they are fighting “disinformation” and promoting government health services and are happy to report that private donations haven’t dried up.
They also want governments to keep their borders open, blah, blah, blah.
There is no way to promote social distancing in refugee camps, but Miliband does offer up a suggestion that more soap is needed because we all need to know this.
Miliband:
Everyone needs to know Anthony Fauci washes his hands fifty times a day and, if possible, know that their local trusted people are doing the same.
It is along articlethat you might want to save for future reference.
Only time will tell if the ‘carnage’ arrives in refugee camps like this million-plus Rohingya camp at Cox’s Bazar, but I find it interesting that it has been three weeks since the first case was reported there and there has not been any widespread infection where I expect there is no social distancing and little hand washing happening.
I told you the other day that we had a slight increase in the number of refugees entering the US in the month of May. The number is still way below what the refugee contractors*** need to assure that their federally funded budgets are flush with your involuntary contributions via Washington.
Today I checkedWrapsnet (FY18 data) for the Muslim refugee numbers and learned this:
The percentage of Muslims entering as refugees is way down compared to Bush and Obama years. It now stands at 15% when it was approaching 50% under Barack Hussein Obama.
(Total admissions so far 14,321 and 2,184 are listed as Muslims of some sect or another.) But….
See my Rohingya Reports category with 224 previous posts: https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/category/rohingya-reports/
…much to my surprise I see that Burmese Muslims (Rohingya) top the list!
My first thought when I saw this news, that the OIC was again ginning up a PR campaign to paint the Burma (Myanmar) Buddhist government as a bunch of Islamophobes and human right abusers, was this: So why aren’t any of you big mouth countries displaying Muslim charity and inviting Rohingya to live in your countries?
Where are you Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE?
No fear! Burmese monks marched against the OIC in 2012: http://www.buddhistchannel.tv/index.php?id=51,11144,0,0,1,0#.WvQvj4gvw2w
Readers DO NOT FORGET! The US has invited 14,882 Rohingya in the last ten years to live in your towns. And, they are still arriving now even under the Trump Administration. But, they are not being “welcomed” in to rich Muslim countries!
Chris Boian, a senior communications officer with the U.N. Refugee Agency, the UNHCR, says that there have been 
