Nigerian refugees in Niger struggle for food and water

Thousands of Nigerian refugees in neighbouring countries such as Niger have been struggling for resources since fleeing attacks by the Boko Haram group.

The Nigerian army has taken back the rebel group's last remaining strongholds in the northeastern Borno State and, while some people have started returning to their devastated towns and villages, thousands remain in neighbouring countries, including Niger, Chad and Cameroon.

Although many no longer feared Boko Haram, but they these people are struggling to get on with their lives because of a lack of resources. They are hungry and thirsty. Curfew imposed from 7pm until the morning has negatively affected business.

Masses of refugees

Boko Haram violence in northeast Nigeria has, since it began in 2009, mutated into a vast regional crisis confronting Nigeria and its three Lake Chad Basin neighbours, Chad, Cameroon and Niger.

Insecurity has driven more than 187,000 Nigerians across the border, but incursions by Boko Haram into the surrounding countries have generated growing numbers of internally displaced people too, according to UN data.

There are 157,000 internally displaced people in Cameroon, 74,800 in Chad and more than 127,000 in Niger.

As of the most recent available data, there are 2,066,783 displaced people in Nigeria, the UN has said. More than 15,000 people have been killed and 2.3 million forced from their homes since the conflict began.

The UN children's agency UNICEF said in July that nearly half a million children were at risk of "severe acute malnutrition" in the area around Lake Chad.

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THE lantern, or light organ, of a particular Photuris firefly is covered with jagged scales that dramatically enhance the brightness of the light that the insect produces. * Jagged scales Consider: Researchers have found that tiny scales on the lantern surface of some fireflies form a corrugated pattern, somewhat like overlapping shingles or tiles. The scales tilt up at one end by just 3 micrometers —less than one twentieth the thickness of a human hair. Yet this tiny tilt lets the lantern shine almost 50 percent more brightly than it would if the scales formed an even surface!

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IGNAZ SEMMELWEIS may not be a household name, yet his work has benefited most modern families. Born in Buda (now Budapest), Hungary, he received his medical degree at the University of Vienna in 1844. On taking up his post as assistant to a professor at the First Maternity Clinic of Vienna’s General Hospital in 1846, Semmelweis faced an appalling reality —more than 13 percent of the women giving birth there died from a disease called childbed fever. Various theories as to the cause of this disease had been proposed, yet no one had solved the mystery. All attempts to reduce the mortality rate proved futile. Troubled by the spectacle of numerous mothers suffering a slow, agonizing death, Semmelweis determined to find the cause of the disease and prevent it.

Rielyn Co

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