Doctors without Borders (AzG) will provide medical assistance in the Ter Apel application center from Thursday. That reports the aid organization Thursday morning. It is the first time that MSF provides medical assistance in the Netherlands. In any case, a team of four to six people will be working in Ter Apel for the next four to six weeks, ANP news agency reports.
The organization says that living conditions outside the gate of the application center site are comparable to those in places like the Greek refugee camp Moria. Toilets are not well maintained and there are no showers. The team, which visited Ter Apel last Friday, spoke to asylum seekers who had not been able to wash for a week and had therefore contracted skin diseases.
MSF will provide basic health care in Ter Apel. This concerns the treatment of infections, skin diseases and injuries, but also the provision of prescriptions for chronic diseases and the provision of psychological first aid. The organization emphasizes that this should not be necessary in the Netherlands. “It is unprecedented that we will provide medical assistance in the Netherlands, but the circumstances in which these people find themselves are inhumane,” says Judith Sargentini, MSF director for the Netherlands.
Tents prohibited
The Groningen application center has been overcrowded for months, where all asylum seekers in the Netherlands have to go first for their application. Due to the crowds, people have been forced to sleep outside for weeks. This week, seven hundred asylum seekers slept in the open air – the highest number to date – on unfolded cardboard boxes and their own luggage. The Groningen security region has banned the use of tents and other camping equipment on the site on Wednesday, saying it is for the safety of asylum seekers.
In the night from Tuesday to Wednesday, a three-month-old baby died in the sports hall of Ter Apel. In the sports hall, which serves as an emergency solution for the shortage of reception places on the site, asylum seekers sleep on mats on the floor. The cause of death of the baby is unknown. GroenLinks and the PvdA, among others, have asked State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum and Migration, VVD) for clarification about the baby’s death.
Also read: Ter Apel: sleeping outside and a dead baby