Asia Pacific

For the past several weeks, the Philippine Red Cross emergency healthcare unit in the Philippines have been tending to the youngest of patients, children and babies coughing with fever, and whose bodies and faces are covered in red rashes. In early February, the local authorities declared a measles outbreak and since then 355 people have died, most of them children under 5 years of age.

Story by: Susan Cullinan, Australian Red Cross Images Tiane Hokins/Dave Hancock, Australian Red Cross Elder Joyce Dirdi has spent four days away from her homelands in the remote Northern Territory township of Booroloola. She’s among 1000 people shelter …

It has been six months since Sulawesi was hit by a powerful and shallow earthquake, tsunami and liquefaction. While survivors face a slow and complex road to recovery, many jumped immediately into action to help others who were even worse off.

Sukmuang Tippadoe, 92, lives alone in his home in Huai Ping Village in Thailand’s northern province of Lamphun. Apart from a recurring skin rash, he says he’s trying to stay healthy to avoid going to the doctors.

Three-year-old Mohammed Sofit lies on the cold bare earth inside his family home. For the last 24 hours he has been suffering from chicken pox – an all too familiar ailment in the sprawling Kutapalong camp, built into steep hillsides close to the Myanmar-Bangladesh border.