New York - The staggering human toll taken by tuberculosis (TB) and malnutrition as well as the devastation caused by wars in the Central African Republic (CAR), Sri Lanka and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), are among the "Top Ten" Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2006, according to the year-end list released today by the international humanitarian medical aid organization Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).
We know that media coverage does not generate improvements on its own. However, it is often a precondition for increased assistance and political attention. There is perhaps nothing worse than being completely neglected and forgotten.MSF USA Executive Director Nicolas de Torrente
The ninth annual list also highlights the lack of media attention paid to the plight of people affected by the consequences of conflict in Haiti, Somalia, Colombia, Chechnya and central India.
"Many conflicts worldwide are profoundly affecting millions of people, yet they are almost completely invisible," said MSF (USA) Executive Director Nicolas de Torrente. "Haiti, for example, is just 50 miles from the United States and the plight of the population enduring relentless violence in its volatile capital Port-au-Prince received only half a minute of network coverage in an entire year."
According to Andrew Tyndall, publisher of the online media-tracking journal The Tyndall Report, the ten countries and contexts highlighted by MSF accounted for just 7.2 minutes of the 14,512 minutes on the three major U.S. television networks' nightly newscasts for 2006. Treating malnutrition, TB, and Chechnya were mentioned, but only briefly in other stories. Five of the countries highlighted by MSF were never mentioned at all.
The 2006 "Top 10" list also focused on the devastation caused by TB and malnutrition.
The frightening situation of worldwide TB became even worse in 2006 with the detection of extensively drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR TB), a strain that is resistant to both first-line antibiotics and to two classes of second-line drugs. At the same time, none of the TB drugs currently in development, however promising, will be able to drastically improve TB treatment in the near future.
"TB destroys millions of lives around the world every year, but we're not seeing the necessary urgency to tackle the disease," said Dr. Tido von Schoen-Angerer, director of MSF's Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines.
Hope is on the horizon, though, for malnutrition, with new strategies based on outpatient treatment that relies on ready-to-use therapeutic foods (RUTF), like Plumpy'nut, showing tremendous promise. Unfortunately, these strategies are not implemented as widely as they could be.
"Acute malnutrition contributes to the deaths of millions of children every year," said de Torrente. "New strategies in treatment of moderate and severe acute malnutrition have helped MSF treat more than 150,000 children in Niger over the past two years. Millions more children throughout the world could benefit if such strategies were more widely implemented."
While the conflicts in the Darfur region of Sudan and in eastern Chad garnered significant media attention in 2006, the steady focus did not translate into improved conditions for people caught up in the conflict.
"Even though there was more reporting about Darfur than about other crises, the situation continued to deteriorate to the point where MSF and other aid groups had to scale back their programs," said de Torrente. "We know that media coverage does not generate improvements on its own. However, it is often a precondition for increased assistance and political attention. There is perhaps nothing worse than being completely neglected and forgotten."