Many doctors and health workers have been forced to resign or been imprisoned because of political activism since 1988. This has led many of them to go abroad. At the same time, the lack of government support for public health facilities and staff throughout the country has forced many health professionals to change their professions in order to survive. Every day at the border we can see evidence of the collapse of Burma s health system. Malaria and tuberculosis are rampant, and people have no knowledge of prevention or proper treatment.
Women have little knowledge of family planning and often use abortion as a means of birth control.
At our clinic this year, we have already had 235 cases of abortion complications, most of which were performed by unqualified traditional birth attendants from Burma. One NGO working on AIDS in Burma has recently estimated that 2.5 per cent of Burmese people or over 1 million people are already infected with the AIDS virus. To address this health crisis, my colleagues and I have been working with displaced communities along the border, training local health workers who can provide health education and care for their people. We have now trained over 200 health workers from different ethnic opposition groups. They have now set up a joint health outreach programme, which is able to assist over 100,000 people in the border areas of Burma.