Edited News | WHO , IOM
Ahead of International Migrants Day (December 18), the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) urgently called on governments and health providers for better access to Covid-19 vaccines for migrants two years into the pandemic.
“Equitable access to health services remains insufficient, and stigma, discrimination against migrants widespread - as evidenced by the media reports following discovery of the Omicron variant”, said Jacqueline Weekers, Director of IOM’s Migration Health Division at today’s press briefing at the United Nations in Geneva.
“As I speak, millions of asylum seekers, forcibly displaced families and migrant workers are cut-off from reliable health coverage. Millions of migrants in irregular situations face arrest or deportation when seeking health care due to the absence of viable immigration authorities”, Ms Weekers added.
Vaccine hesitancy in migrant communities must be address with specific, tailored interventions. However, the majority of migrants, Ms Weekers stressed, do want access to Coiv-19 immunization but cannot get to them because of administrative, logistical, geographic, cultural, linguistic or financial barriers.
“According to IOM’s analysis of 180 countries, migrants in irregular situations cannot get the COVID-19 jab in at least 45 countries, now out of 46 access remains unclear”, said IOM’s Ms Weekers.
Prior to the pandemic, WHO and the World Bank noted more than half a billion people were pushed into extreme poverty because of out-of-pocket health costs.
“COVID-19 is likely to hold two decades of global progress towards universal health coverage”, assumed Ms Weekers. She added that “we are already witnessing concerning regression in our fights against other deadly diseases like tuberculosis, HIV and measles especially in marginalized and hard-to-reach communities.”
On the occasion of International Migrants Day, the World Health Organisation pointed out how many people on the move might fall between the cracks of health care systems worldwide.
“Today, one out of thirty people are migrants, one out of ninety-five are forcibly displaced. In other words, we are considering, we are concerned about roughly one billion people between migrants, refugees, irregular migrants and IDPs which may be failing out of the access to health systems”, said Santino Severoni, Director of WHO’s Health and Migration Program.
Health is a fundamental human right for everyone, stressed WHO’s Mr Severoni. “Despite we see, we foresee, the topic to be on top of the political agenda of all member states, still refugees, asylum seekers, state-less people, IDPs, migrants especially those in irregular conditions, tend to be excluded from the access to health systems due to lack of inclusive policies, barriers of the systems including languages, or issues related to availability of needed documentation or issues related to cover the costs for accessing those services.”
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Edited News | UNWOMEN
Aid agencies echoed wider warnings of growing signs of widespread starvation in Gaza on Tuesday, as UN-partnered international food security experts released their most dire assessment yet of the situation in the wartorn enclave.
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Edited News | IOM , UNDP , UNHCR
Sudan: urgent help needed as more than 1.3 million war-displaced people begin to return home
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Edited News | UNRWA , WHO
Gaza: SOS messages describe people fainting from hunger; UN health worker detained
Worrying alerts from United Nations staff in Gaza who have been fainting from hunger and exhaustion over the past 48 hours have increased fears for people’s survival in the devastated enclave, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday.
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Edited News | UNHCR , UNOG
Over 11.6 million refugees risk losing aid access due to funding cuts, says UNHCR
Approximately one in three refugees and other vulnerable individuals normally supported by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) are expected to lose out from funding cuts, it said on Friday.
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Edited News | OHCHR
Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, made the following announcement on the Office’s opening of a new mission in Bangladesh.
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Edited News | OHCHR
“The surge in the number of Afghans forced or compelled to return to Afghanistan this year is creating a multi-layered human rights crisis requiring the urgent attention of the international community,” UN Human Rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said on Friday.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk on Friday called for accountability and justice for the killings and other gross human rights violations and abuses in the southern city of Suweida.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNHCR
Syria: hundreds killed in Sweida, ‘widespread’ violations as civilians flee for their lives
Amid violent clashes in southern Syria’s Sweida governorate, a picture of grave human rights abuses and rising humanitarian needs is emerging by the hour, the UN said on Friday.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
At the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva the UN Human Rights Spokesperson Liz Throssell made the following statement on the latest number of civilian casualties in Ukraine.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
The UN Human Rights Office on Tuesday called for investigations into hundreds of killings of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank by Israeli security forces and settlers, warning against ongoing forced mass displacement of the Palestinian population.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNRWA
Nearly 900 people have been killed in Gaza in recent weeks trying to fetch food, with most deaths linked to private aid hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the UN human rights office, OHCHR, said on Tuesday.
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Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
The United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH) and the UN Human Rights Office have today released a report detailing the evolution of violent gang incidents beyond the capital Port-au-Prince since October 2024 up to June 2025, and the resulting loss of life and mass displacement.