BC doctor helps children in South Sudan as conflict and climate change collide

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As Reza Eshaghian flew into South Sudan, he saw dry land turn to water beneath him.

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The camp where the Vancouver doctor would spend three months working with Doctors Without Borders appeared like a rectangular island in an endless swamp, protected from floodwaters by a rough dike. As his plane landed on a nearby airstrip, similarly protected by a dike, he could see a man canoeing on the other side of the barrier a meter above him.

The water remained high for the duration of Eshaghian’s trip from November to February, even as South Sudan’s dry season was well underway. As BC looks forward to summer, the country in East Africa is headed into another rainy season with no foreseeable end to the flooding that has so far impacted 835,000 people, killed 800,000 livestock, and decimated thousands of hectares of farmland, according to the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs.

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Eshaghian, who works as an emergency room doctor in Vancouver, Richmond and Delta, said he has never seen the impacts of climate change so clearly on any of his eight assignments with Doctors Without Borders.

“Here is an issue that is devastating lives, and we are all apart of that,” he told Postmedia in an interview Friday. “This is our problem.”

Eshaghian said it was strange to hear reports of flooding in BC while working in South Sudan, where intense seasonal rains in early 2021 caused the White Nile to overflow. In the aftermath of almost a decade of civil war, thousands of people are still living in “protection of civilians” camps run by the United Nations. The new government and various non-governmental organizations took over camp operations when a peace deal was reached in 2020.

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As people struggled to find dry land, the camp near Bentiu where Eshaghian would be stationed as a medical team leader grew by about 30,000 to 130,000 people, while the population of nearby towns and unofficial camps also swelled. The disaster caused widespread malnutrition, with food assistance only providing half of the nutritional needs of people who lost their entire livelihoods, including fields and livestock.

“I’ve seen malnutrition before,” said Eshaghian. “Here as well, the first to suffer are the children.”

Malnutrition leaves children more susceptible to infections. Pregnant and breastfeeding mothers and their babies are also at higher risk. Doctors Without Borders is involved in treating malnutrition at the camp hospital as well as outside camp, in addition to conducting water and sanitation projects.

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“The thing that’s so crushing is that the future seems so bleak,” said Eshaghian “The conflict is not over, and climate change is ongoing.”

Eshaghian said he tried to find information about a long-term plan for the region — “What happens next? Can they predict when the water will go away? Will it get worse?” But he doesn’t have clear answers.

Back in BC, he has returned to work while taking time to process the trip. Since receiving his medical degree, he has tried to go on one trip each year with Doctors Without Borders.

“It always takes some time to return to my normal self,” he said.

This time, the realization that “climate change is here,” not some time in the distant future, lingers with him.

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