Senegal: Thousands Urgently Need Pain Relief

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Dr. Abdul Kasse, oncologist, holds a packet of oral opiate pills in Dakar, Senegal on July 4, 2013. Senegalese doctors struggle to obtain these medications. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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A shipment of oral morphine pills arrived at Dakar’s Dantec Hospital in July 2013, after a shortage. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Dantec Hospital’s Joliot Curie cancer ward is the only specialized institution for cancer treatment in Senegal. It is so crowded that cancer patients sit two per bed for transfusions and chemotherapy. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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During a morphine shortage, a cancer patient in Dakar clutches onto the railing of her hospital bed because she is in pain and the medication she needs is unavailable. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Morphine powder is used to create morphine syrup, which the World Health Organization has designated an essential medicine. There is only one company that imports the powder in Senegal and shortages are common. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Dantec Hospital goes through a complicated process to obtain morphine powder, which the pharmacy mixes with water and sugar to make morphine syrup. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Prepared morphine syrup at Dantec Pharmacy; one week’s supply costs around US$1. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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A nurse changes bandages for a cancer patient who does not have morphine for her pain. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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A six-year-old boy with liver cancer in the waiting room at Dantec Hospital Pediatric Oncology Ward, the only facility in Senegal that provides pediatric cancer care. His family lives far away, so he must stay with his uncle in Dakar. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Adama, a 14-year-old girl with Leukemia, traveled over an hour each week for treatment at Dantec Hospital, where she got morphine syrup to relieve her pain. Adama passed away in June 2013. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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A four-year-old boy with bone cancer arrived at Dantec during a morphine shortage in severe pain, after six months of misdiagnosis in other facilities. He passed away two weeks after this photo was taken. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Brain lesions cause two-year-old Alpha Balde’s eyes to bulge out from his skull. His form of cancer (acute lymphoblastic leukemia) has a survival rate of over 90 percent in the United States, but the treatment he needs is unavailable in Senegal. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
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Podor Health Center serves approximately 24,000 people but has no morphine. For palliative care, patients must travel 10 hours to Dakar. © 2013 Angela Chung/Human Rights Watch 417060
Tens of thousands of patients in Senegal suffer from excruciating pain every year without relief. Unnecessarily restrictive government regulations and poor training for healthcare workers impede their effective medical treatment.
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