Sudanese NGO visits White Nile to assess disease outbreaks

The convoy will visit the hospital on the island in the White Nile on Thursday and Friday and aims to provide health services for free.
The chair of the organisation, Professor Nasreldin Mofareh, who was Minister of Religious Affairs in the government of Abdallah Hamdok, told freelance journalist El Noor Abdallah that the convoy “includes a number of medical specialists, including psychologists.”

Medics will also collect information about the spread of diseases in the area, such as viral hepatitis. Cancer cases will also be recorded, and if possible, referred to the cancer institute in Khartoum.
Mofareh, who is originally from El Gezira Aba, reported an outbreak of viral hepatitis there amounting to 17 per cent of the population, the highest in the country. The average rate for Sudan is three to four per cent (about three million people). 

White Nile state recorded 30 cases of dengue fever in November. Radio Dabanga recently reported that real numbers are likely to be higher because there is only one laboratory in the whole of Sudan that can confirm vector-borne diseases. 

The organisation, which was founded by the former Minister, is active in the areas of training and capacity building for local religious leaders and provides health services and humanitarian aid to rural areas and poor urban neighbourhoods. It has previously conducted two trips to Kordofan region and a number of suburbs in Khartoum. 

In January 2021, Mofareh exposed the Sudanese Ministry of Religious Affairs and Endowments for being involved in corruption during the Al Bashir era (1989-2019). Officials of the Ministry “transferred awqaf (endowments*) to organisations of the Islamic movement and to some of its individual members”.

* Under Islamic law, a waqf (pl. awqaf), a mortmain property, is an inalienable charitable endowment. It typically involves donating a building, plot of land, or other assets for Muslim religious or charitable purposes with no intention of reclaiming the assets. A charitable trust may hold the donated assets.