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Encounters in Moria refugee camp: Part 2
(In case you missed it, here is Part 1.)
— WARNING, these cases can be upsetting. It certainly was upsetting to listen to them first hand, but I have tried to keep them as non-graphic as possible —
What you don’t expect
The other category of situations are the things that you can’t prepare for, that you don’t even know you should be preparing for before working in a refugee camp. Torture and rape are two of those things. When training to be a nurse, looking forward to being able to do relief or development work, torture never even entered my head as one of the things I needed to psych myself up for. Tropical diseases like malaria, infectious diseases like tuberculosis or HIV, nasty, festering wounds, yes. Torture, no. Rape I thought maybe if I worked in the Emergency department or in gynaecology. Every day? No. I was never ready for the physical or psychological effects of torture and rape that hundreds of patients have presented to me with. Even once I knew to expect it, there is no way to be ready for it.
The first patient I encountered who had been tortured, the only one the first time I was in Moria camp on Lesvos, before the borders closed, was a man who had been tortured for his religion. His teeth had been pulled out, his legs broken, fingers hurt. Despite that he had managed to swim across the sea from Turkey. It took two attempts, and on the first try he lost his best friend. I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t handle the…
