Randall Hackley Behind barbed-wire fences at this camp in northern Jordan, about 33,000 Syrians—half of them children—exist uneasily, housed in rows of rudimentary shelters that barely protect them from the winter cold.
To help, non-governmental organizations supply water and relief groups visit to offer aid.
The UN said at least 82 water trucks a day fill the camp’s water tanks so that 950,000 liters of water a day can flow to some 76 taps.
Boreholes also provide 3.2 million liters of drinking water a day, giving camp residents access to about 20 liters a day, or 5 gallons per person.
Water and wastewater networks were constructed by the humanitarian group ACTED.
Play activities "help take their mind off things," Akbik said.
The Rohingya crisis even prompted a UN video that ended with a plea to better address the refugees’ urgent needs of clean water.
At the informal Rohingya camps in southeast Bangladesh, water pumps next to open sewers have stoked fear of disease outbreaks, and led to vaccination, clean water and sanitation drives.
The World Health Organization reports that diptheria is "rapidly spreading among Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazar," a city in Bangladesh.
The Sahrawis have come a long way since eight years ago, when water was trucked in via UNHCR tankers and outhouses were crude holes beside mud-brick homes.