DistantNews
Support us
🇳🇵 Nepal /Disasters & Emergencies

Flood-displaced mothers struggle for privacy and care

From Kathmandu Post · () English

Summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Ongoing story
  • Flood-displaced mothers in Nepal are living in crowded shelters where cigarette smoke, limited food and a lack of privacy complicate breastfeeding and infant care.
  • The UNFPA estimates that about 4,430 pregnant women are living across the hardest-hit parts of Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading.
  • Damaged roads and bridges are making it harder for women to reach hospitals and obtain emergency obstetric care.

For Pariyar, a breastfeeding mother caring for a three-month-old baby, the flood refuge offers neither privacy nor the conditions her child needs. She fled Trishuli on August 26 and now shares a shelter with dozens of strangers, where men smoke near her while she nurses.

There is cigarette smoke, the smell of alcohol, and the baby cannot sleep.

· PariyarA displaced breastfeeding mother described conditions inside the crowded shelter where she is caring for her newborn.

“There is cigarette smoke, the smell of alcohol, and the baby cannot sleep,” she said. Pariyar said her milk supply had fallen since the floods, while formula appeared to upset the baby’s stomach. Food also arrives late and in insufficient quantities. “If there was a safe place, and the baby could get her vaccinations here, that would be better,” she said.

Her experience reflects a wider crisis along the flood-hit Bhotekoshi-Trishuli corridor northwest of Kathmandu. Landslides have damaged roads and bridges, leaving pregnant women and new mothers struggling to find female-friendly spaces, food suited to nursing schedules and routes to emergency care if labor becomes dangerous.

If there was a safe place, and the baby could get her vaccinations here, that would be better.

· PariyarShe called for safer shelter conditions and access to infant vaccinations.

The United Nations Population Fund estimates that about 4,430 pregnant women are living across 15 municipalities in Rasuwa, Nuwakot and Dhading, the districts hardest hit by the floods. The figure is a humanitarian planning estimate based on an affected population of about 310,000, not a count of individually identified women. It suggests that about 492 births could occur in the following month, with roughly 74 women potentially needing emergency obstetric care.

They aren’t giving any special food for babies.

· Sharmila ShresthaShrestha described the lack of suitable food for children in another flood shelter.

Aid workers say relief systems built around generic needs often overlook breastfeeding and postpartum mothers, their need for privacy and infants who cannot simply eat adult food. In another shelter, Sharmila Shrestha sleeps on a classroom floor with her 14-month-old daughter and her sister-in-law’s 18-month-old son. Both children eat the same heavy food as adults. “They aren’t giving any special food for babies,” Shrestha said. “If only we had a decent, proper place to stay. That would bring some peace of mind.”

If only we had a decent, proper place to stay. That would bring some peace of mind.

· Sharmila ShresthaShe said adequate accommodation would make life safer and more manageable for displaced families.
About this summary

Originally published by Kathmandu Post. Summarized and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

More Stories

From Our Blog