Conditions in the Calais camp known as the Jungle are diabolical, with cramped makeshift tents plagued by rats, water sources contaminated by faeces and inhabitants suffering from tuberculosis, scabies and post-traumatic stress, according to a new report.
The first study of conditions in the migrant and refugee camp reveals the shocking reality inside one of Europe’s largest shanty towns, where about 3,000 residents, including an increasing number of women and children, are living in conditions “far below any minimum standards for refugee camps”.
Researchers from the University of Birmingham, working with the Doctors of the World group, found a piped water tap to have E coli and Coliform present above safe standards. Both bacteria are “indicative of faecal contamination”, according to the report.
“This study exposes the awful truth about the Calais refugee crisis – that it is a humanitarian emergency of the first order in one of the world’s most thriving nations,” said Leigh Daynes, the director of Doctors of the World .
“Refugees are hungry and distressed, and they live in diabolical conditions. Their suffering is all the more acute because the often perilous journeys they undertook to get to France were physically arduous and emotionally fraught.”
The majority of inhabitants questioned by researchers over a two-month period between April and June were refugees fleeing war or despotic regimes in Sudan, Afghanistan, Syria and Eritrea, she said.
“Internationally agreed standards for the provision of aid and protection in refugee situations are nowhere to be found in Calais. That is a blight on the reputation of European states, who should and can do better, as they often do in refugee crises elsewhere.”
A lack of washing facilities and refrigeration for food was resulting in diarrhoea, stomach cramps, fever and vomiting, the report found, while a lack of debris collection from the camp encouraged rats and mice, which can carry, salmonella and Leptospira, that latter of which is associated with Weils disease and can cause organ failure.
Val says it is disgraceful that people can be left in such dire conditions. I am rapidly losing respect for governments and I am not and never have been a rebel.
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