Shrapnel and bullet wounds, burns and fractures are causing death and injury amongst children caught in the conflict in Northeast Sri Lanka where hospitals are overflowing and desperately short of anaesthetic and essential medicines, according to a UNICEF statement.
In a statement released on February 17, UNICEF said it was extremely alarmed at the high number of children affected by the violence in Vanni.
"Hundreds of children have been injured in the fighting and evacuated in the past week," said UNICEF Representative in Sri Lanka Philippe Duamelle.
"Children are victims of this conflict by being killed, injured, recruited, displaced, separated and denied their every day needs due to the fighting. Instead of hope, fear defines their childhood."
The UN organisation has been repeating its message to the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and the LTTE to protect children from the fighting.
The UNICEF statement comes amidst reports of severe food and medicine shortage which is severely affecting children.
Thousands of infants have been seriously affected due to the lack of crucial food supplies such as powdered milk. The situation is exasperated with thousands of desperate mothers of newborns suffering the sustained food blockage and acute malnutrition becoming infertile and unable feed their babies.
Amongst the worst affected are those with chronic diseases, whose deaths are caused by the Government of Sri Lanka’s block on medicines. In the overcrowded ‘safety zone’ area where 200,000-250,000 civilians have been herded, there is a high rate of infectious diseases present amongst children such as respiratory diseases and diarrhoea.
Treatment is difficult as medicines are scarce. Even in makeshift hospitals many injured civilians are suffering without antibiotics treatment as even a single Panadol is difficult to come by. A patient struggled hard to purchase one Panadol tablet from a shop for 1,000 Rupees.
"People are coughing. Many of them are infected with viral infections including chicken pox." said a local resident.
