Algeria Emergency: donate to help the victims of the wildfires

A wave of forest fires struck northern and north-eastern Algeria from 26 to 30 August 2026, during a heatwave above 45 °C and strong winds. Fires broke out in sixteen wilayas, with Jijel at the epicentre, alongside Béjaïa and Tizi Ouzou.

President Abdelmadjid Tebboune declared three days of national mourning on 27 August. Algeria's Civil Protection announced that the fires were fully under control on 30 August.

The latest official toll released by the Algerian Ministry of the Interior, on 26 August 2026, reports 12 dead and 54 injured, 6 of them in intensive care.

This toll has not been updated since, even though the fires burned for four more days, and several independent media outlets as well as Le Monde report a higher human toll, with no official confirmation to date.

We would rather give you the official figure with its date than an estimate no one can verify. This page will be updated as soon as a consolidated toll is published.

The most effective way is a financial donation to an organisation that buys supplies locally, as close as possible to real needs. In practice:

Donate to an NGO already working with people on the ground in Algeria
Choose a monthly donation, because care and rehousing take weeks
Don't send medicines or personal parcels without official coordination on the ground
Share verified information and appeals from organisations on the ground

Because those needs are already covered. Algerian citizens and the Algerian Red Crescent have delivered large quantities of food, water, mattresses and hygiene products, to the point that people on the ground report logistics overwhelmed by unsorted donations.

One more convoy would help no one and would tie up hands that are needed elsewhere. We fund what is still not covered: care for burn victims, temporary housing for families who have lost their homes, and the basics to start again.

Your donation funds three things, identified on the ground as of 1 September 2026:

Care, first and foremost for people with severe burns: dressings and compresses, IV fluids, painkillers, and treatment for respiratory damage from smoke inhalation
A roof: temporary housing for families who have lost their homes
The basics to start again: clothing, generators and electrical cables, to restore power to households left without it

Over time, there is also psychological support for those affected. It is the longest-lasting and most neglected need: in the response to Algeria's 2022 wildfires, it accounted for 3% of the health budget of the operation. We tell you the categories of need confirmed on the ground, not a detailed shopping list we couldn't guarantee to stick to.

Because burns don't go out with the flames, and a burned-down house isn't rebuilt in a week. A severely burned patient stays in hospital for around fifty days on average and undergoes twice as many surgical procedures as a patient with an ordinary burn.

Some of the injured were airlifted to specialist centres in Zéralda, near Algiers, and in Oran, because local hospitals lacked capacity. Meanwhile, thousands of families have lost their homes and need rehousing.

The needs for care, shelter and support are starting now and will last for months.

No, not as individual donations. The World Health Organization strongly advises against unsolicited shipments of medicines: they often arrive out of date, unauthorised in the country, labelled in a language no one can read, and they clog up warehouses that are already full.

After the 2004 tsunami in Sri Lanka, of 56 tonnes of medicines received, more than 80% had not been requested and 150 tonnes had to be destroyed. That's why LIFE collects no medicines from the public and prefers to buy locally, through authorised medical channels.

LIFE is a French international solidarity NGO founded in 2009 and working in more than 25 countries. Our accounts are public, our activity reports are available online, and donations to us qualify for 66% French tax relief.

For this operation, we work with Dir El Kheir, a French humanitarian association established in Algeria, which reports needs from the ground and updates them as the situation evolves.

Dir El Kheir, a French humanitarian association based in Nanterre and well established in Algeria. It reports the real needs from the ground: not food or hygiene kits, already covered by local solidarity, but medical supplies for people with severe burns, temporary housing for affected families, and the basics to start again.

Purchases are coordinated locally, and medical purchases with local health facilities.

Yes. If you pay tax in France, your donation to LIFE qualifies for French tax relief of 66% of its amount, up to 20% of your taxable income.

So a €60 donation costs you just €20.40 after tax relief. Your tax receipt is sent to you automatically by email, once a year.

Yes, as a monthly donation to our emergency fund: it pays for our operations the moment a crisis hits, without waiting for an appeal to come in.

You can change or stop it at any time from your donor account.

Yes. You can create your own fundraising page in a few minutes and share it with friends, family or colleagues.

Donations received are automatically allocated to the Algeria Emergency operation, and every donor receives their tax receipt.