ETHIOPIA HEALTH MINISTER DISCUSS REHABILITATION OF DAMAGED INFRASTRUCTURE

High level federal delegation from Ministry of Health led by minister Liya Tadesse (PhD) has arrived in Tigray, Mekelle, today to observe the status of severely damaged health infrastructures, provide needed health materials, and discuss rehabilitation issues with regional authorities.

The minister is making her first trip since the peace agreement signed between the federal government and Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in Pretoria, South Africa in November last year.

According to regional media Tigray Television, the delegation which was welcomed by Emanuel Haile (PhD), head of the Tigray health bureau upon arriving at Alula Aba Nega International Airport, will visit the damaged health facilities in both the eastern and central zones of Tigray.

Tigray’s health facilities are one of the worstaffected civilians infrastructures due mainly to targeted looting and deliberate attacks by Ethiopian and their allied forces from Eritrea and the neighboring Amhara region during the two years war.

As far back as March 2021, teams from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reported that health facilities across the Tigray region have been looted, vandalized and destroyed in a deliberate and widespread attack on healthcare. Of the 106 health facilities visited by MSF teams between mid-December 2020 and early March 2021, nearly 70 percent had been looted, and more than 30 percent had been damaged; only 13 percent were functioning normally.

SOURCE: Addis Standard