By MOHAMMED AMIN in Khartoum | Thursday, July 18  2013 at  19:33

Blue Nile chiefs measure grain to be distributed to their people at a refugee camp. Yellow fever has reportedly killed 80 people in refugee camps in Sudan’s Blue Nile region. FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

Yellow fever disease has reportedly killed 80 people in refugee camps in Sudan’s Blue Nile region.

The camps are the homes to people fleeing the fighting between the Khartoum government forces and the Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) North rebels.

A food security officer in the region, Mr Simawi Adlan told Tamzog, a local radio, that yellow fever outbreak had been reported at Doro and Batil camps on the border between Sudan and Ethiopia. “Around 80 people died because of this disease, just last June,” he confirmed.

Mr Adlan attributed the cause to pollution and unsanitary conditions in the camps.

He warned of a more serious health disaster in the camps, urging aid organisations to provide latrines for the refugees.
The government of Sudan has been battling SPLM\North in South Kordofan and Blue Nile states since June 2011.

Khartoum has denied international humanitarian organisations access to the affected areas since the eruption of the war.