Funding cuts are forcing dozens of health clinics in Sudan to close, aid groups warn

CAIRO -- An additional three dozen health facilities serving more than 400,000 people in Sudan are closing this year due to global aid cuts, worsening a dire humanitarian situation in a country torn by more than three years of war, aid groups said Tuesday.The cuts come to a health care system that once numbered 6,500 primary healthcare facilities and 300 public hospitals, but that already was decimated in the first year and a half of war. By September 2024, the World Health Organization said that up to 70-80% of facilities in the worst-hit areas were either closed or barely functioning.Sudan plunged into war in April 2023 when tensions between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, escalated into full-scale fighting across the country. The war killed at least 59,000 people, displaced some 13 million and pushed parts of the country into famine. More aid organizations are pulling out as clinics are left without necessary medicine or funding, forcing patients to face costly transportation and dangerous journeys to get treatment, said Doctors Without Borders, or MSF.“These cuts are stripping away what little capacity remains, closing facilities, sending health work...