Late in 2022, MSF’s team in Southern Nations, Nationalities and People’s Region (SNNPR) of Ethiopia received an alert about a health crisis in southern Omo Valley where an isolated population were experiencing high rates of visceral leishmaniasis, also known as kala azar. Kala azar is a neglected tropical disease spread by small insects (sandflies) that is almost always fatal without treatment. MSF’s assessment team confirmed an alarming number of kala azar cases, as well as high rates of malnutrition. We began active case finding through mobile clinics that also provided primary health services, as well as supporting the Jinka hospital to treat patients. Within a few weeks, the capacity of the hospital to treat kala azar was overwhelmed and MSF teams began setting up tents to treat kala azar patients.

The project in south Omo builds on work MSF has done in other parts of Ethiopia to treat kala azar, including the Abdurafi project where we have been treating kala azar and snakebites for 20 years.

This comms package aims to provide an account of the kala azar emergency in south Omo valley and how MSF teams are responding, through the voices of patients, healthcare workers and MSF team members. This package is also part of an ongoing effort to count a prevailing narrative that NGOs are only concerned with the situation in Tigray by showing MSF’s work across Ethiopia.