More than 80 percent of healthcare facilities have exhausted their supplies of essential medicines in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where violence continues unabated, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reported on Wednesday.

For 30 years, the country’s mineral-rich east has been riven by conflict, with violence intensifying earlier this year the M23 –- a Rwandan-backed armed group — seized the key cities of Goma and Bukavu.

Clashes between the M23 and the Congolese army and allied militia have left thousands dead and millions displaced since January.

Meanwhile, a US-brokered peace deal between the DRC and Rwanda in June is proving slow to take effect on the ground.

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In September, the ICRC studied 240 health centres and clinics in North and South Kivu provinces, where the front line has been stable since March.

More than 85 percent of these facilities faced dwindling medication supplies and nearly 40 percent struggled with a shortage of staff, the ICRC reported.

“This dire situation is the result of armed violence and the fact that many humanitarian organizations have had to halt their activities because of a lack of funding,” according to an ICRC statement.

Healthcare facilities were being “inundated with wounded people”, with many crossing front lines and long distances only to find “the medicines they need aren’t available”.

More than 70 percent of the facilities assessed had admitted people wounded as a result of armed violence since the start of the year, the statement continued.

Medical centres struggle to obtain medicines, even when they are available, due to difficulties in delivering them across front lines.

Shortages “very often affect essential medicines and those that are supposed to be free,” such as vaccines, antimalarial and tuberculosis drugs, rape kits, and rapid HIV tests.

“Currently, more than 80 per cent of health facilities in the Kivu provinces receive no support from humanitarian partners and are only operational thanks to the remarkable commitment of their staff on both sides of the front lines,” said Francois Moreillon, head of the ICRC’s DRC delegation.

AFP

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