WHO, UNICEF call for unimpeded access to Afghanistan to deliver critical health supplies

As humanitarian needs in Afghanistan increase, World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF have called for immediate and unimpeded access to the country to deliver medicines and other lifesaving supplies to millions of people in need of aid, “including 3,00,000 people displaced in the last two months alone.”

“While the main focus over the past days has been major air operations for evacuation of international citizens and vulnerable Afghans, the massive humanitarian needs facing the majority of the population should not – and cannot – be neglected. Even prior to the events of the past weeks, Afghanistan represented the world’s third largest humanitarian operation, with over 18 million people requiring assistance.

“WHO and UNICEF are committed to stay and deliver for the people of Afghanistan,” WHO has said in a statement issued here.

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“However, with no commercial aircraft currently permitted to land in Kabul, we have no way to get supplies into the country and to those in need. Other humanitarian agencies are similarly constrained,” the statement added.

“WHO and UNICEF call for immediate establishment of a humanitarian airbridge for sustained and unimpeded delivery of aid into Afghanistan,” read the statement.