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Sudan Tribune

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IOM reopens maternity ward in Bentiu two years after closure

March 8, 2016 (JUBA) – The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said it had restored maternal health care services in Bentiu town for the first time in nearly two years.

IOM offers maternal care for mothers in Bentiu ( Photo IOM)
IOM offers maternal care for mothers in Bentiu ( Photo IOM)
Midwives at the maternity ward provide ante-natal and post-natal care, care during deliveries, family planning support and prevention of mother-to-child transmission of Human Immune Virus (HIV).

The hospital was damaged in fighting in 2014. The maternity ward was ransacked and critical infrastructure was damaged, including delivery chairs and incubation units.

Most of the population of Bentiu still lives in the UN protection site but IOM says that the town population has been slowly growing, with nearly 22,700 people registering for assistance in Bentiu town and surrounding areas since July 2015.

The restored maternity ward is now equipped with furniture, equipment and medical supplies.

“The State Minister of Health has indicated plans to assign additional midwives to enable the ward to run 24-hours a day,” agency said in a statement issued Tuesday.

IOM further said it had extended its Tuberculosis (TB) testing and treatment programme to Bentiu hospital to help with early diagnosis and treatment of TB cases for people who cannot access health services at the nearby UN protection of civilians (PoC) site, where IOM recently opened a TB testing laboratory.

Nyachom Gatluak, a resident of Bentiu, said the new health facility was all along considered to be pride to women left without proper medical equipments in the town.

“You know the opening up of these services to the community in Unity state means a lot as it helps hundred of women who were left without facility in the area,” she said.

Gatluak has been living in the United Nations protection of civilian camp since mid-December 2013 when a calls for political peaceful reform within the country’s ruling party, the SPLM, turn violent in Juba and later extended to the other states in South Sudan.

(ST)

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