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Syria crisis: Whole of Syria response, Turkey update: Situation report #3, May - June 2019

Countries
Türkiye
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Sources
WHO
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Highlights

In response to the humanitarian crisis in Syria, WHO and partners provide life-saving health services to Syrian refugees in Turkey and to populations in northern Syria from Turkey under the Whole of Syria approach.

Refugee Health Programme

• The WHO published the 2018 annual report of its health emergency response activities in Turkey for the Refugee Health Programme and cross-border operations.

• WHO built skills among Turkish journalism students in three workshops to promote reporting on refugees with fairness and dignity.

• Bridging a gap in health care delivery for older and disabled, 235 Syrian patients in Izmir and Hatay received weekly home care aimed at ensuring their well-being and integration.

Cross-border operations

• To respond to the newly displaced, WHO is supporting an additional eight mobile clinics, five surgical units, two primary and two secondary health facilities.

• WHO released emergency stock to health facilities, providing an estimated 92 200 treatments: 2200 for surgical and trauma care, 50 000 for secondary health care and 40 000 for primary health care.

• In all, WHO trained over 754 health workers to improve provision of health services in May.

Situation overview

Turkey hosts 3.6 million Syrians, the highest number of refugees in the world. The majority of Syrians are residing in urban areas, and over 100 000 reside in 12 temporary accommodation centres located in the south-east of the country. Since the beginning of the crisis, the Government of Turkey has offered to protect and assist all Syrians in need under a temporary protection regime. Registered Syrians are eligible to receive the same health services and quality standards as Turkish nationals. In order to strengthen primary health care for this population, a network of 178 active refugee health centres has been established. In these centres Syrian health professionals trained by WHO provide linguistically and culturally sensitive health care services to their fellow nationals. Since 2016, these centres have provided over 6.7 million health consultations to Syrians. In other more specialized health care services, Turkish health professionals provide care with the support of interpreters.