Medical care and social justice in the jungles of Myanmar

Abstract

The past year was the worst year for displacement since World War 2. In 2015 alone, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, there were an estimated 12·4 million newly displaced individuals, including 8·6 million internally displaced people (IDPs) and 1·8 million refugees, quadrupling the number of newly displaced people in just 4 years. The sudden and urgent plight of persons from Syria caught up in a civil war is well known, but for more than 60 years the ethnic Kayin (Karen) in eastern Myanmar (Burma) have been enduring human rights violations, oppression, and displacement in their long struggle for human rights and autonomy. The health status of the Kayin has suffered, despite the best efforts of the Backpack Health Worker Team, the subject of Grace Baek's documentary The Black Zone.