KABUL, 11 November 2021, (TON): By the time the Taliban took over Afghanistan in mid-August, at the main hospital in Maidan Shar, a city of 35,000 in the centre of the country, most of the staff had not been paid in months. Essential supplies such as medicine and food were scarce, and disappearing fast.

Almost all international support came to a halt, and it seemed certain that for health workers in lifesaving facilities throughout the crisis-wracked nation, and the millions they serve, things would only get worse.

But then, as one midwife recalled, in testimony exclusively supplied to UN News, the support started coming, thanks to a groundbreaking new agreement led by the UN’s development agency.

In the past few weeks, the UN Development Programme (UNDP), under an agreement with the Global Fund, has quietly extended a lifeline to Afghanistan’s health system and all the families that depend on it, providing $15 million to avoid the collapse of the entire sector.

She said “we were able to save the lives of most critical patients, and we were able to support inpatient services, for more than 500 women and children.”

With the weather turning from autumn warmth, to a freezing winter, she used some of the salary she had finally begun to receive, to get some blankets and other materials to keep her family safe.

The midwife is just one of the over 23,000 health workers, in nearly 2,200 health facilities in 31 provinces, that have received wages since the scheme got underway. UNDP has also paid for medicines and health supplies.