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Wellness & Healthy Living

Refugee numbers are spiking into unprecedented territory in 2024

By Mike Hanlon
June 20, 2024
Refugee numbers are spiking into unprecedented territory in 2024
World refugee day
World refugee day
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Of the 117 million humans currently displaced, 40% (47 million) are children, 73% come from just five countries (Afghanistan, Syria, Venezuela, Ukraine and South Sudan) and 40% are hosted in just five countries (Iran, Turkey, Colombia, Germany, Pakistan). Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023.
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Of the 117 million humans currently displaced, 40% (47 million) are children, 73% come from just five countries (Afghanistan, Syria, Venezuela, Ukraine and South Sudan) and 40% are hosted in just five countries (Iran, Turkey, Colombia, Germany, Pakistan). Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023.
The above quote highlights just how difficult conditions invariably are for refugees. Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023, and there are now one million Rohingya in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar refugee camp
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The above quote highlights just how difficult conditions invariably are for refugees. Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023, and there are now one million Rohingya in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar refugee camp

Today (June 20) is World Refugee Day and with people across the world experiencing an overload of angst these days, we wanted to make sure you were aware of the importance of the day and the perilous plight of your fellow humans ... because the world is now producing refugees in record numbers.

Do a bit of historical research and you'll realize that mistreating refugees has been traditional for centuries, and we are continuing to mistreat them. From the French Protestants (Huguenots) of the 18th century to the Irish fleeing the Potato famine of the 19th century, forcibly displaced peoples have been routinely mistrusted and mistreated, but never in the numbers that are evident today.

There are now more than 120 million displaced refugees in camps around the world, and many are starving simply because they aren't allowed to work in their host country, and the amount of money available is not enough to feed them.

Imagine being forced to flee your home and leave behind everything you can't carry.

Imagine starting from scratch again in another country with no money and one or more children. The thought alone is debilitating, but this year more than 120 million people are facing exactly that same bleak and uncertain future.

The above quote highlights just how difficult conditions invariably are for refugees. Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023, and there are now one million Rohingya in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar refugee camp
The above quote highlights just how difficult conditions invariably are for refugees. Two million children were born in refugee camps in 2023, and there are now one million Rohingya in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar refugee camp

Of the 117.3 million humans displaced at the end of 2023, 40% (47 million) were children, 73% come from just five countries (Afghanistan, Syria, Venezuela, Ukraine and South Sudan) and 40% are hosted in just five countries (Iran, Turkey, Colombia, Germany, Pakistan). Indeed, most refugees are hosted by third world countries, because the wealthy countries don't want them.

According to the UNHCR’s Global Refugee Forum, held in December 2023, the number of refugees is estimated to be at least 130 million by the end of 2024, but with the conflicts raging in South Sudan, Ukraine and Myanmar, that number could be a lot higher by the close of the year.

The global refugee crisis deserves a collective response and equitable responsibility sharing from the international community but with the politicization of everything these days, refugees are a soft target for politicians, and uncomfortable news doesn't attract readers and hence doesn't get covered nearly as much as it should by the media.

If you wish to donate to UNHCR you can do so here, though Amnesty International currently has benefactors matching donations dollar-for-dollar, so you can double the effectiveness of your kindness here.

Wellness & Healthy Living
3 comments
Mike Hanlon
Mike Hanlon
As a photojournalist, Mike’s work has been published in a dozen languages across 20+ countries. He has edited or managed over 75 different print publications, each with a different target audience: sports, automotive, advertising, marketing, design, ad infinitum. Mike has been working in the internet for more than 25 years and was the veteran of five internet start-ups before founding New Atlas in 2002.

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Christian
This is a tough one. Imagine working your tail off to provide for your family in your impoverished home country, just barely making ends meet, and suddenly there's a flood of new people needing help, taking what few resources you already have, taxing an already strained system, and pushing everything over the edge.

Much of the problem is simply proximity. Try to move 40 million kids by airplane. That's over 40,000 flights on an airbus 380 just to shuttle kids across the ocean. Who's planes are you gonna use for that? And then what do you do with them when they're there? And who's going to acclimate them to a totally foreign culture, infrastructure, and society?

Sure it can be done, but it's slow.

And then there's the trouble of...how do you stop refugees from bringing the mindset, education, culture with them that contributed to the problems in their country in the first place?

There's no easy answer. And simply saying "Well, the rich countries can pay for it!" isn't a good answer. You're wealthy, by the refugee standards. Are you going to house them? Or pay for them to be housed and trained, and brought here?

And in reality, we ARE paying for it. We send a lot of aid to these situations, not always in the form of cash that can be used and abused, but in supplies, personnel, etc.
fen
They agreed in the past that collective response is a bad thing, instead there should be a forced neighbour response. I think its called the Dublin protocol. I may be wrong.

It works off the principle that every country is directly responsible for their neighbours, so its in their best interest to make sure their neighbour is secure. You might think this isn't fair for someone like Ireland, or England, or France. But it means Ireland has to try help Iceland, UK, USA, Canada, Spain and France... France has to try help Spain, belgium, Germany, Italy etc..

Poland is supposed to get involved in Ukraine early on and stop the war from happening, knowing failure to do so will be 2 million refugees in their country. But the EU is supposed to force belarus to do the same, so belarus use their russian leaning to stop it too.

If you tell Ukraine, their refugees will be shared across the world, then they have no incentive to seek peace.

This is one of the reasons for stability across the EU.
aksdad
Notice that none of the refugees fled free, democratic republics. They come from countries with dysfunctional governments that evolved from their culture. Prosperity and freedom don't come about by accident. They arise from cultures where people consciously decided, and sacrificed, to create the conditions for them. The U.S. Declaration of Independence and Constitution are the greatest governing documents in history, attested by the extraordinary freedom and prosperity of 330 million people from a variety of cultures and ethnicities. There is a lot for struggling countries—and U.S. citizens—to learn from them.