Sudan's War Forces Cancer Patients on Deadly Hospital Journeys — SkimNews
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- Sudan's civil war has produced the world's largest displacement crisis, forcing 13 million people from their homes, while the UN has documented 205 attacks on healthcare facilities by both warring factions since fighting began in 2023
- Dr. Tom Catena runs Mother of Mercy hospital in the Nuba Mountains as the sole permanent surgeon for a region the size of Austria, administering chemotherapy doses alongside emergency care because 37% of Sudan's health centers have been destroyed
- Fatouma Mahdi Ahmed Saeed, a cervical cancer patient from Nyala in South Darfur, sold a calf and traveled hundreds of miles past checkpoints and drone strikes to reach Catena's hospital after being turned away by South Sudan
- Ifrah Ahmed, a 10-year-old osteosarcoma patient from Babanusa, had her right leg amputated at the hip after arriving at Mother of Mercy; Catena says the cancer likely spread to her lungs and she must return before year's end through fierce fighting
- The Rapid Support Forces' alliance with SPLM-N turned the Nuba Mountains from a refuge into a staging ground for the push toward Khartoum, meaning cancer patients now traverse active frontlines — the nearest cancer-capable hospital is roughly 700 miles away in Port Sudan
- Without an on-site oncologist, Mother of Mercy mails tissue samples to the United States, with biopsy results taking up to six months, forcing Catena to diagnose cancers by clinical exam when they are already far advanced
- International aid cuts have compounded the crisis by disrupting chemotherapy supplies and essential drug chains, according to Doctors Without Borders, gutting what a 2025 paper in Global Oncology identified as Sudan's once regionally leading cancer care system
Why it matters: With Sudan's oncology infrastructure shattered by war and collapsing aid pipelines, patients who once had regionally leading care now gamble their lives on trips through active frontlines to reach Dr. Tom Catena's hospital. Children like 10-year-old Ifrah Ahmed arrive needing amputations and incomplete chemotherapy, and Catena himself cannot confirm whether treatment will save them.
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