Villages in northern Arakan State face medicine shortages

By DMG 13 Oct 2022

DMG Newsroom
13 October 2022, Sittwe

With the Myanmar military restricting access to some townships in Arakan State, some villages are facing medical shortages, according to local residents experiencing health challenges.

The regime has imposed travel restrictions in Maungdaw, Buthidaung, Rathedaung and Mrauk-U townships amid renewed fighting between the military and Arakan Army (AA) in Arakan State over recent months.

Locals in Thittonenar Village, Maungdaw Township, are facing medicine shortages due to the military’s travel restrictions, said a villager who did not want to be named for security reasons.

“We have run out of medicines and the military council has banned locals from transporting medicine into the area. We have difficulties accessing medicine,” the villager told DMG.

The anonymous villager added that if there is an emergency health issue, the military allows local people to travel, but medicine shortages plague much of the state outside of its urban centres.

There are rural healthcare facilities in the villages, but residents say there are patients who have gone from being mildly sick to facing emergency situations due to the lack of necessary medicines.

A pharmacy owner in Sittwe told DMG that about 90 percent of the distribution and sale of medicines has stopped due to the military council’s restrictions.

“The regime has imposed strict restrictions on medicine and prohibited us from transporting it into other areas,” the pharmacy owner explained.

In a statement on September 29, the Arakan National Party (ANP) called on the Myanmar military to lift its travel ban on local and international nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) providing humanitarian aid to internally displaced people (IDPs) in Arakan State.

Pharmaceutical companies and pharmacy owners in Arakan State are currently not permitted to ship drugs and related items through security checkpoints set up by the military.

Pharmacy owners say that if the restrictions on the transportation of medicines continue in their current form, shortages will grow more dire.

“The military’s ban on business, education, and health [activities] in the event of fighting violates international laws. The military council is committing a war crime by imposing some restrictions on the local people,” said U Aung Thaung Shwe, a former Arakan State lawmaker for Buthidaung Township.

Since mid-September, Myanmar’s military regime has barred local and international NGOs from travelling to multiple townships in Arakan State following the renewed fighting between junta troops and the Arakan Army.