About me

I am a British human rights journalist reporting on conflict, contagion and climate change. Every now and then I accidentally take a nice photo. On this site I present a small selection from the 200 plus articles I have written over the last 10 years.

In West Africa, I covered the controversial opening of Africa’s first free clitoral restorative clinic for victims of female genital mutilation (FGM), run by an alien-worshiping sex cult in Burkina Faso. I wrote on the children of Mali’s Bella ethnic minority, who want to grow up to be slaves and I documented forced-begging of children as young as six by renegade Qur’anic masters in Senegal.

In the Extreme North of Cameroon, I reported from Minawao refugee camp on the fierce fighting between Islamic sect Boko Haram and the Nigerian authorities. I also wrote about how cyclical droughts and floods in the region were exacerbating this conflict, and despite international efforts to reduce hunger and poverty in the Sahel, numbers of malnourished and food insecure continued to rise even in non-emergency years.

I broke the news that Ebola had reached densely populated Conakry and that it was the deadly Zaire strain – raising the stakes for the slow international response as an African problem suddenly became a global health and security threat. I was the first foreign correspondent to report from ground zero of the deadly outbreak, a story on hiccups and survivors from Gueckedou. On a second trip to Guinea, I reported how fear and mistrust was making it harder to stop the disease and how Africa’s medicine men could have helped avoid this had they not been sidelined in the response.

In South Asia, I produced rare footage of life in the makeshift Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh, where some 60,000 people were living hand to mouth in what the United Nations described as amongst the most squalid conditions on Earth. I reported undercover from Myanmar on how farmers in Shan State had little option but to grow opium to feed their families and from Pakistan about devastating Islamist attacks on art and culture.

I am also passionate about SDG3! I am a lead writer with ten years of experience in impact storytelling for international aid and development organisations including Médecins Sans Frontières, the United Nations and the World Bank. Writing includes academic papers, policy briefs, funding proposals, progress reports, editorials, and online blogs. I have an MSc in Global Health Policy from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), specialising in conflict, development and infectious disease (in particular HIV, tuberculosis and malaria).

Alongside writing articles and policy papers, I also work as a author. In May 2022, SAKTHI, my debut issue-based novel (fiction) on forced marriage and women’s rights will be published by Bluemoose Books – an independent publisher based in northern England where the story is set. The book is an unapologetic commentary on identity, gender and religion in a multipolar society. Through friendship, wit, and spice, Sakthi slacklines between cultures making you laugh and cry, whilst leaving you with plenty of food for thought.

Follow me on Twitter: @mishahussain

Contact me

Tell me about a story idea, or reach out to me if you need to write engaging policy papers.