A severe shortage of hospitals and Health centres continues to endanger mothers and children across the Jebel Marra region of Darfur, forcing communities to rely on extraordinary physical effort to reach life-saving care.
In remote villages, residents carry pregnant women on their shoulders for kilometres to reach the nearest medical facility. Transport options remain extremely limited, and roads are often impassable. For women experiencing obstructed or complicated labour, the journey frequently proves fatal. Local communities report that dozens of mothers have died while being transported toward health centres.
Footage documented by the Darfur Network for Human Rights (DNHR) captures groups of women, men and young people carrying a pregnant woman toward a distant clinic. The images illustrate the daily reality in conflict-affected areas where adequate maternal healthcare remains largely inaccessible.
DNHR has issued an urgent appeal to United Nations agencies, international humanitarian organisations, donors and health partners to intervene immediately. The organisation calls for the establishment and equipping of hospitals, maternity wards and primary healthcare centres throughout Jebel Marra. Immediate assistance is also needed to deploy trained midwives, provide emergency obstetric care, supply ambulances, essential medicines and establish reliable referral systems.
Access to maternal and child healthcare is a fundamental human right, DNHR states. The organisation urges the international community to treat this crisis with the same urgency afforded to other humanitarian emergencies unfolding across Sudan. Without rapid intervention, preventable deaths will continue to mount in a region where the journey to a clinic remains a matter of life and death.
