‘Life is meaningless’: despair for Rohingya refugees as chronic illness blights camps
People who fled genocide in Myanmar for the world’s biggest refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, are finding their lives devastated by diseases such as cancer and diabetes
The tumours that kept growing in her chest were cut out three times before Noor Saimun, a Rohingya refugee in Bangladesh, was tested for cancer. By the time it was diagnosed, the cancer had spread from her breast throughout her body.
Saimun now spends her days incapacitated by pain, lying on the floor of her bamboo shelter. Around her, many of her neighbours suffer other types of non-communicable and chronic illnesses – cancers, diabetes and hypertension – but they often go without treatment and the tools they need to manage their conditions.