If you’re going to go into labour, don’t do it at night in the internally displaced persons’ Sangaya Camp because there are no health workers to help and soldiers patrolling the area will not allow residents out when it is dark.

The camp, in the Dikwa local government area, is just one of many camps that simply do not have adequate ─ in many cases no ─ health facilities.

Most of northern Nigeria’s internally displace persons’ camps are struggling. Some have limited healthcare facilities ─ many others, if not most, do not have any and the living is hard, especially for pregnant women.

With the coronavirus Covid-19 worsening globally and millions of people in need of help, adequate healthcare is more important now than ever before.

Alhaji Kurna Cinguwa, the manager at Sangaya Camp, told RNI that there used to be a temporary healthcare facility in the camp but it had moved.

He said there were 7,875 people and 1,523 households in the camp. “That’s a lot of people who are without healthcare.”

The nearest hospital, he said, was far away and camp residents did not have money to pay for transport to get treatment.

“There are soldiers in the town at night and they don’t allow people to move freely because of Boko Haram insurgents in the area.”

Malam Hussaini, a resident, said the government had to come to their aid.

Fatima Bukar, a representative of women in the camp, said the temporary clinic that had been in place was moved about eight months ago.

“Sometimes we have emergency cases but there is nothing we can do because the primary healthcare facility is far from us and soldiers will not allow us to go there at night.”