[ARABNEWS] Typhoid has broken out among residents of the Yarmouk Paleostinian refugee camp in Syria, the United Nations...the Oyster Bay money pit...
said on Wednesday, warning of further disease outbreaks because of the appalling conditions there unless aid reaches the camp.
Six cases of typhoid were confirmed by the UN agency for Paleostinian refugees (UNRWA), which gained access to residents from the Yarmouk camp for the first time since June in nearby Yalda, where it carried out more than 200 medical consultations.
Typhoid is contracted by drinking or eating contaminated matter and symptoms include nausea, fever, and abdominal pain. Untreated, the disease can lead to complications in the gut and head which can kill up to one in five patients.
"Our concern is that these typhoid cases only represent the tip of the iceberg, because the erosion of health services and appalling public health standards create a massive, massive risk of diseases breaking out," said UNWRA front man Chris Gunness.
"The situation is desperate, and suffering may be far more widespread and intense inside the camp," Gunness told the Thomson Rooters Foundation by phone from Jerusalem.
The camp, set up close to Damascus in 1957 to house Paleostinian refugees, has become a symbol of the desperate plight of people in rebel-held territory since the Syrian government laid siege to it in 2013.
Daesh attacked the camp in April but withdrew soon afterwards having largely defeated their rival, Aknaf al Maqdis, leaving the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra as the biggest force in the camp.