BACKGROUND During 1999-2000, great parts of Ethiopia experienced a period of famine which was recognised internationally. The aim of this paper is to characterise the epidemiology of mortality of the period, making use of individual, longitudinal population-based data from the Butajira demographic surveillance site and rainfall data from a local site. METHODS Vital statistics and household da...

By early 2004 more than one million people had sought to escape violence and suffering in the three states of the Darfur region of Sudan. More than 180 000 of these displaced people are refugees in Chad; the majority, however, remain in Darfur, crowded into more than 100 camps scattered across 540 000 km. They are dependent on external help for protection, adequate supplies of safe drinking-wat...

Humanitarian Policy Group Britain's leading independent Britain's leading independent Britain's leading independent Britain's leading independent Britain's leading independent think-tank think-tank think-tank think-tank think-tank on international development international development international development international development international development and humanitarian issues humanitar...

We welcome Tonelli et al’s contribution to raising the profile of non-communicable diseases (NCD), especially on NCD medicines in humanitarian emergencies, a topic that to date has received very little attention. However, we would question the message and conclusion of this paper on three grounds. First, from a clinical perspective, the inclusion only of mixed insulin for diabetes exacerbations...

The report presents key data on Kosovo refugees in Albania during the 1999 crisis in Kosovo. In a three-month period, from March through May 1999, Albania received, accommodated, and cared for 479,223 officially registered refugees from Kosovo (FR Yugoslavia). Many foreign governmental and non-governmental organizations helped the Albanian government during the crisis. The Government cooperated...

To the Editor, I read with interest the report byWalk et al [1] cataloguing the impressive achievements of a 2009 humanitarian mission by the US Naval Ship Comfort. The authors took pains to point out the efforts to partner with host nation surgeons and medical doctors to provide appropriate screening and—when possible—postoperative follow-up, and mentioned the goals of incorporating education ...

The impacts of disasters have been recently attracting increasing attention of researchers and policy makers. Nevertheless, there has been little consensus about how an efficient inventory management model can be developed for post-disaster conditions. Victims of a disaster are generally gathered into shelters during and after a severe disaster to ensure their security. Many of these evacuees d...