Shifting migration patterns and worsening security conditions have intensified a humanitarian crisis in Chad. More than 2.2 million people have been forcibly displaced, including an estimated 928,000 refugees who have arrived in eastern Chad from Sudan since April 2023, with rising insecurity in Sudan’s Darfur region causing further influxes. 

In the Lake Chad Basin, the combined impacts of climate shocks, cholera and attacks by non-state armed groups are creating a rapidly deteriorating crisis of malnutrition and food insecurity. In May 2026, renewed violence triggered a new wave of displacement, forcing more than 60,000 people from their homes, the majority of whom are women and children. They are living in precarious conditions with limited access to essential services, including sexual and reproductive health support and gender-based violence prevention and response.

Across the country, women and girls are disproportionately affected by the overlapping crises, which expose them to heightened risks of maternal mortality, gender-based violence, exploitation and harmful coping mechanisms. The collapse of community support systems and limited availability of reproductive health and protection services exacerbate vulnerabilities, particularly for pregnant women, adolescent girls and survivors of violence. 

Amid mounting needs, severe funding shortages have forced humanitarian partners to scale back life-saving reproductive health and protection services, leaving vulnerable women and children with critical gaps in support.

UNFPA has deployed midwives across the country, providing care including antenatal and postnatal consultations, assistance with safe births, family planning services, treating sexually transmitted infections, clinical management of rape and referrals for obstetric complications. In the eastern provinces of Ouaddaï and Wadi Fira, UNFPA has also distributed reproductive health kits and medical equipment to health facilities, while working with partners to raise awareness of gender-based violence and operate safe spaces for women and girls. 

Updated 30 July 2026