"The boy's glasses fell off when he was shot at, and now he couldn't see"

Dr Nathalie MacDermott, a paediatric and clinical research fellow at Imperial, still thinks daily of the families she encountered in Greece.

Working in Lesbos Island and Macedonia in September with charity Samaritan's Purse, Dr MacDermott helped desperate parents, grandparents and children clamber from the many boats that arrived on the shore.

"Fathers would cry as they reached the shores - hugging their children, and grateful they had made it safely across the treacherous sea in a rubber dinghy. The children - who were sometimes no more than a few weeks old - were often on the verge of hypothermia."

To mark World Refugee Day, Dr MacDermott, who also worked in Liberia during the Ebola crisis, has shared pictures of the families she met during her time in the European refugee crisis.
 
She adds that there are still many families in desperate situations, who need urgent help: "It is very easy for us to put people into categories, such as 'refugee', 'asylum seeker' or 'migrant'. But we need to remember these are first and foremost people, who as a result of a horrific situation have lost their homes and their careers, witnessed horrendous atrocities, and potentially lost family members. All they want is somewhere to live where their children will be safe and can get an education.

"At the moment we are shutting the door in their faces, when they need us most. History will not look kindly on this situation. We are wrong to assume because we live in a nice, safe country such a crisis could never affect us. One day we might be those people asking for help - would we want the door closed on us too?"