Zimbabwean Health Workers Call for Crisis Response...SIGN THE PETITION..

PHR's colleagues in Zimbabwe have appealed to the outside world to respond to the alarming deterioration of their health system. Medical and public health workers in Zimbabwe report the following:

• HOSPITAL CLOSINGS: Public health workers in Harare report that due to lack of medicine, equipment, services, and staff, public hospitals and clinics are essentially closed, resulting in preventable deaths. There is no access to care for those who cannot afford private clinics. The only maternity hospital in the capital is also closed. Patients with fractures, meningitis and other acute and dangerous conditions are being sent home, according to another medical source.
  
• CHOLERA EPIDEMIC: A cholera epidemic is spreading throughout the country and daily death tolls are on the rise. Fresh water is no longer pumped into urban areas, which will only exacerbate the spread of this infectious disease caused by contaminated water. An unnamed doctor at Harare hospital described the situation as a "disaster of unimaginable proportions".
  
• DISRUPTION OF MEDICINE: Essential medicines are unavailable to treat the very diseases that the government's gross negligence has exacerbated. Anti-retroviral therapy for HIV/AIDS patients and TB treatment for chronically ill patients has been severely disrupted.
  
• FOOD INSECURITY: The government's recent suspension of the delivery of vital humanitarian assistance severely threatens access to a population of 2 million Zimbabweans who depend on assistance from the World Food Programme (WFP). By the end of this year, the number could double, according to the Programme.
  
• VIOLENT POLICE CRACK-DOWN ON DEMONSTRATION BY HEALTH PROFESSIONALS: Riot police forcefully dispersed hundreds of doctors, nurses and other health workers who assembled at the Parirenyatwa Hospital in Harare to protest poor salaries and working conditions.
  
• MEDICAL SCHOOL CLOSINGS: Early this week, authorities closed indefinitely the country's most prominent medical school and sent students away.
  

Diplomatic isolation and economic sanctions against the Mugabe regime have thus far failed to curtail widespread and systematic human rights violations including willful denial of health care and obstruction of humanitarian aid as well as mass killing, forced displacement, torture and arbitrary arrest. The current government has acted with impunity and must be held to account.
A letter from PHR's Frank Donaghue on the emergent situation in Zimbabwe can be found at the Physicians for Human Rights web site, http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/library/letter-09-30-2008-frank.html

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Health Emergency in Zimbabwe: Act Now

Zimbabwe is in the midst of a devastating health emergency, and PHR needs your help to urge the US and the international community to take action.
Public health workers in Harare report that due to lack of medicine, equipment, services, and staff, public hospitals and clinics are essentially closed, resulting in preventable deaths and the destruction of families and communities. A cholera epidemic is spreading throughout the country and daily death tolls are on the rise. Fresh water is no longer pumped into urban areas, which will only exacerbate the spread of this infectious disease caused by contaminated water. A doctor at Harare hospital described the situation as a "disaster of unimaginable proportions".
Your colleagues—doctors, nurses, public health leaders, medical students, and human rights activists in Zimbabwe—are fighting for their patients. Hundreds held a protest this week to call for more medicine and supplies for their patients, but were violent disbursed by riot police. Also this week, the government closed the medical school in Harare indefinitely, leaving hundreds of students on the street—and millions of Zimbabweans without the next generation of health leadership.
The health situation in Zimbabwe, which has been declining for years, is now untenable. The international community must take urgent action to save lives. Sign the petition below and urge Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to take decisive action TODAY to stop needless deaths in Zimbabwe.

Full Petition Text:

Dear Secretary of State Rice,

We, the undersigned, ask you to take decisive action to address the collapse of the Zimbabwean public health system. Just as a cholera outbreak is sweeping through Harare, public hospitals and clinics across the country, including Zimbabwe's two main national referral hospitals, have closed for lack of drugs, supplies and health workers. The health situation in Zimbabwe, which has been declining for years, is now untenable. Urgent action by the US and the international community is needed to save lives.

Earlier this week, doctors, nurses and medical students tried to stage a protest to call for government action but were dispersed by riot police. The convergence of hospital closings, disruption of water and electricity, a major cholera epidemic spreading throughout the country, and a breakdown in delivery of medications for HIV-AIDS, TB, malaria and chronic illness will lead to massive loss of life if individual governments and the United Nations do not provide a robust and immediate response.

Given the continued gross negligence of the government of Zimbabwe and the callous disregard for the safety and wellbeing of its citizens, together with the dire signs of impending lethal epidemic disease, we the undersigned call on the United States government to immediately rally the international community and UN to take decisive action to:

A. Assure that a responsive, legitimate government is in place that can protect the lives and health of the people of Zimbabwe.

B. Deliver immediate, robust humanitarian aid and medicine into the country, demanding that the government remove all obstructions to this assistance.

C. Intervene to re-open and support the hospitals and medical school, and assure vital infrastructure, supplies, safety and support so that health workers can care for their patients.



SIGN THE PETITION HERE PLEASE