O. with her mother in an MSF clinic in Kibati. November 2008.
Photo by Clio Van Couter/MSF
O. is six years old. Her feet are swollen. Mumuza Muhindo, an MSF nurse working with the mobile clinic in Kibati, diagnoses kwashiorkor, a severe form of malnutrition.
"We have given her ready-to-use therapeutic food so she gains strength quickly," explains Mumuza. "She will have to eat three of these ready-to-use food sachets a day on top of the family meal. You can see she is eating well for the moment so I am confident that she will be better soon. The main problem is that most people living in Kibati don't have the means to buy food as they flee the fighting."
O. came with her mother and her 13 year old brother straight from Rugari to Kibati, a 20km walk.
"I was at home on Monday when the fighting started again, I took what I could carry and my two children. We couldn't go to Kibumba as they were fighting there as well. I came straight to Kibati," explains the 58 year old mother. "I was living in a camp in Rugari after I fled the fighting one year ago. This is the second time I’ve fled. I am tired of this situation. I am alone with my two children. My husband died during fighting eight years ago."
"In Rugari, in the camp I was living in, we didn't receive enough to eat. They gave me a food ration that was supposed to feed my entire family for one month, but after two weeks we barely had food left. And since Monday, we haven't eaten anything except some banana juice. I have no money and no work here."
This is the second time O. has been treated for malnutrition. She was looked after at a nutritional centre in Rugari, where she received therapeutic milk. But the recent lack of food and the constant movement have worsened her condition.
O.'s mother is one of the lucky ones who found a place to live in Kibati. She is sharing a small hut with other people, but most refugees who have arrived since Monday just sleep on the grass.
O.'s full name has not been used to protect her identity.