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Janice Bryant
MAP International
4700 Glynco Parkway
Brunswick, GA 31525
MAP International Partners with Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals and the World Health Organization to Airlift Critical Medicine to Rohingya Refugee Camp in Bangladesh
Brunswick, GA, August 14, 2023 – When genocidal violence and brutality against the Rohingya people in Myanmar escalated in August 2017, hundreds of thousands of refugees poured across the border into Bangladesh.
The Rohingya people are a predominantly Muslim minority group living in Myanmar, a country which is predominantly Buddhist. The Rohingya have suffered decades of persecution, but targeted attacks and unspeakable human rights abuses intensified in 2017, causing more than 700,000 Rohingya refugees to flee to neighboring Bangladesh over the last five years.
Now, nearly 1 million Rohingya – about half of which are children – live in the world’s largest refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh. These refugees rely entirely on humanitarian assistance to meet their basic needs of food, water, shelter, and healthcare.
Despite the best efforts of humanitarian aid organizations, the sheer volume of people in the refugee camps has created overcrowded and unsanitary living conditions, where food insecurity and sickness run rampant.
Scabies, a highly contagious skin infestation, is one health problem that has drastically increased among Rohingya refugees due to the unsanitary living conditions. Medical groups on the ground have managed over 135,000 scabies-related consultations in the past year alone – approximately 750 cases per day, far exceeding capacity.
Sadly, about 80% of these patients have been children, who are most impacted by the relentless discomfort of the infestation. Life in the refugee camps is difficult enough without having to live with the unbearable itching that comes with untreated scabies.
MAP International, a global health organization based in Brunswick, Georgia, recently partnered with the World Health Organization and Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals to airlift critical medicine that will provide widespread treatment for this scabies outbreak.
Donated by Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals, 3.2 million tablets of ivermectin recently landed in Bangladesh and will soon be used in a mass drug administration, which will be coordinated by the World Health Organization.
A mass drug administration is critical to public and global health to contain and eliminate the infectious spread of scabies among refugees and is one of the most effective ways to address this issue. By providing medication to treat a large portion of individuals within the infected area, this multi-organizational collaboration will significantly impact the lives of the refugees in Bangladesh.
“Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals is grateful to have had the opportunity to support MAP International and the WHO in their efforts to assist those in need,” says Mike White, Edenbridge’s Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing. MAP International’s mission is to provide medicine and health supplies to those in need so they might experience life to the fullest and together with Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals were able to create a powerful solution that the WHO implemented to address this public health crisis.
“We are honored to be a part of this project which will bring much-needed relief to so many Rohingya who are suffering,” says Steve Stirling, MAP’s President and CEO. “This partnership with Edenbridge Pharmaceuticals and the WHO was the key to creating a practical solution to a rather desperate problem. Our desire is that through this medicine, Rohingya refugees will experience both health and hope in the middle of a difficult situation.”
If you are interested in learning more about how you can help MAP International and their partners make a sustainable difference in the world, visit map.org.
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