Salimullah, a Rohingya refugee, has been living in the Indian capital of New Delhi since 2013 when he fled violence in Myanmar. Stateless, and now homeless after a fire razed his camp, the 35-year-old lives in a tent with as many as 10 other people at a time.

Although some refugees in India have begun getting vaccines, no one in his camp has received shots. Just over seven per cent of India’s population is fully vaccinated and vaccine shortages have plagued the nation of almost 1.4 billion.

“The disease doesn’t discriminate. If we get infected, locals will also,” Salimullah said.

For months, the World Health Organisation urged countries to prioritise immunising refugees, placing them in the second priority group for at-risk people, alongside those with serious health conditions.

That’s because refugees inevitably live in crowded conditions where the virus can spread more easily, with little access to the most basic health care or even clean water, said Sajjad Malik, director of the UN refugee agency’s division of resilience and solutions.

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