Excellencies, ambassadors, representatives of the Ethiopian government, officials from the humanitarian and donor communities, ladies and gentlemen,
I welcome this opportunity to honour the courage and dedication of humanitarian workers, drawn from countries the world over, who rush to help others when disaster strikes or armed conflict breaks out.
Even when given the option to leave a crisis situation, many stay on, committed to act as a desperately needed life-line. We respect the memory of those who died while performing this service.
Anyone who follows the headlines knows that the number and severity of humanitarian crises have reached unprecedented levels. These are crises caused by extreme weather events, and these are crises caused by armed conflicts that increasingly last for years.
We know, too, that essential health care is consistently among the top three priorities in communities disrupted by a crisis. Worldwide, humanitarian crises have left more than 80 million people in urgent need of essential health care.
The African Region alone experiences around 100 health emergencies yearly, with the vast majority caused by infectious diseases. Cholera, in particular, can viciously exploit the weakened conditions created by complex humanitarian crises.
Africa, with its strong dependence on rain-fed agriculture, is especially prone to crises caused by extreme weather events, like droughts and floods, that threaten already precarious food supplies. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development stresses the importance of innovation in meeting its ambitious goals, especially the one for health.
To track health needs created by the severe emergency in South Sudan, WHO introduced a standardized kit of rugged equipment capable of providing a real-time surveillance system covering up to half a million people.
This low-cost early warning and response system, which fits in a box, contains field-ready laptops, mobile phones, and a local server that can be configured and deployed within 48 hours. Solar generators and chargers allow the system to function despite erratic electrical supplies.
Innovations like this one can make the health needs of people, even in very remote and troubled areas, immediately visible to health officials during an emergency, when every minute counts.
Ethiopia is also using the kits to augment its national surveillance system.
Ladies and gentlemen,
As we mark World Humanitarian Day this year, we need to give particular attention to the health needs of people trapped in the misery of protracted armed conflicts.
In some cases, humanitarian workers are the only source of essential health services normally provided by governments. Their jobs include making essential medicines and supplies available, running emergency clinics, immunizing children, delivering babies and, sadly, treating often horrific war injuries inflicted on civilian populations.
Far too often, the breakdown in law and order extends to include flagrant violations of international humanitarian law. This year’s theme, “One humanity, one responsibility”, reminds us of the responsibility to protect the safety of humanitarian workers during armed conflicts.
International humanitarian law makes the safety of health facilities, staff, and their patients sacrosanct.
From 2014 through 2015, WHO documented nearly 1000 deaths and more than 1,500 injuries following attacks on health care facilities. Investigation of the 594 individual attacks revealed that a stunning 60% were deliberate.
The use of attacks on health facilities, their staff, and their patients as a tactic of warfare is reprehensible.
Solidarity with our humanitarian colleagues, and the millions of people they serve, compels us not to accept these atrocities as the new normal simply because they have become so common.
World Humanitarian Day is also an occasion to mobilize action that promotes a more humane world. The refugee crisis in Europe has taught us that wars in faraway places will not stay remote.
A more humane world would see far fewer civilians killed, injured, and uprooted from their homes. It would see greater protection of women and girls from violence. It would see no tolerance whatsoever for the use of attacks on health facilities, sieges, and starvation as tactics of war.
As we mark World Humanitarian Day, let us pledge to voice these concerns as an expression of both solidarity in promoting a humanitarian cause and responsibility to the millions who need help just to survive.
The world cannot look upon the magnitude of human misery in these crises with indifference.
Thank you.