THE ORIGINAL FAILED NATION STATE
Somalia: Malnutrition killing hundreds of children, UN says
The fifth drought in as many years has brought Somalia to the brink, raising fears of a deadly famine. Hundreds of children have already died from severe acute malnutrition.
Some 1.5 million children in Somalia are at risk of severe acute malnutrition
Some 730 children have died in nutrition centers around Somalia already this year, the United Nation's children's agency UNICEF said on Tuesday.
Nutrition centers help children suffering from severe acute malnutrition.
The announcement comes a day after the UN warned of a coming famine in the Horn of Africa. The region is facing its fifth consecutive failed rainy season.
"Malnutrition has reached an unprecedented level," UNICEF's Somalia representative Wafaa Saeed said.
Children particularly vulnerable to famine
Saeed said that between January and July this year, "around 730 children are reported to have died in nutrition centers across the country."
She was speaking to reporters in Geneva via a video-link from Mogadishu.
"This is less than one percent of the children who were admitted, cured and discharged. But we also feel that this number could be more, as many deaths of children go unreported."
The prices aid groups pay for emergency water supplies have also increased by between 55% and 85% since the beginning of the year, UNICEF said. Officials said that violence enacted by the Islamist group al-Shabab is also partly to blame.
Drought, war put Somalia on the brink of extreme hunger
According to the UNICEF official, some 1.5 million children are at risk of acute malnutrition. Around half of those are younger than five-years-old.
She added that 385,000 children may need to be treated for severe acute malnutrition.
'We cannot wait to act' WFP tells DW
DW spoke with Petroc Wilton from the UN's World Food Program (WFP) following his trip to the country.
Wilton warned that the famine is "going to affect the most vulnerable first. And that is young children. It is the elderly. It is those living with disabilities. It is those who have been internally displaced by conflict."
"We cannot wait for a declaration of famine to act," the WFP official said, adding that "In 2011, the last major famine in Somalia that claimed more than a quarter of a million lives, half of the people who passed away had died before the official declaration."
"This is an unusually severe drought, but Somalia is very prone to droughts, to floods, to tropical storms, they keep happening," Wilton told DW.
Drought driving Somalia into a crisis
Somalia is on the brink of its second famine in just over a decade thanks to a drought a soaring global food prices.
Saeed explained on Tuesday that the drought had caused a water and sanitation crisis due to dried up water sources.
"Many of those have also dried out because of overuse, and we have around 4.5 million people who need emergency water supplies," she said.
"No matter how much food a malnourished child eats, if he or she doesn't get clean water then they won't be able to recover," said Saeed.
She also warned of the dangers of outbreaks of disease among children suffering from acute malnutrition.
The UN has called on world leaders to respond to the crisis before it is too late and to avoid a repeat of the deadly famine that hit the region in 2011.
UN agencies have warned that around half of Somalia's population is facing crisis hunger levels and that people living in Kenya and Ethiopia will also be affected.
ab/msh (Reuters, AFP)
More than 700 children have died in Somalia nutrition centres, UN says
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Hundreds of children have already died in nutrition centres across Somalia, the UN children's agency (UNICEF) said on Tuesday, a day after the global body warned that parts of Somalia will be hit by famine in the coming months. The Horn of Africa region is on track for a fifth consecutive failed rainy season. A famine in 2011 in Somalia claimed more than a quarter of a million lives, most of them children.
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UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. humanitarian chief predicted Tuesday that at least $1 billion will be needed urgently to avert famine in Somalia in the coming months and early next year when two more dry seasons are expected to compound the historic drought that has hit the Horn of Africa nation.
Martin Griffiths said in a video briefing from Somalia’s capital Mogadishu that a new report from an authoritative panel of independent experts says there will be a famine in Somalia between October and December “if we don’t manage to stave it off and avoid it as had been the case in 2016 and 2017.”
The undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs told U.N. correspondents that more than $1 billion in new funds is needed in addition to the U.N. appeal of about $1.4 billion. That appeal has been “very well-funded,” he said, thanks to the U.S. Agency for International Development, which announced a $476 million donation of humanitarian and development aid in July.
The Famine Early Warning Systems Network, created by USAID, said in a report Monday that famine is projected to emerge later this year in three areas in Somalia’s southeastern Bay region, including Baidoa without urgent humanitarian aid.
Up to 7.1 million people across Somalia need urgent assistance to treat and prevent acute malnutrition and reduce the number of ongoing hunger-related deaths, according to a recent analysis by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification or IPC, used by the network to describe the severity of food insecurity.
The Horn of Africa region has seen four straight failed rainy seasons for the first time in over half a century, endangering an estimated 20 million people in one of the world’s most impoverished and turbulent regions.
Griffiths said meteorologists have predicted the likelihood of a fifth failed rainy season from October to December, and a sixth failed rainy season from January to March next year is also likely.
“This has never happened before in Somalia,” he said. “This is unprecedented.”
“We’ve been banging the drum and rattling the trees trying to get support internationally in terms of attention, prospects, and the possibilities and the horror of famine coming to the Horn of Africa -- here in Somalia maybe first, but Ethiopia and Kenya, probably they’re not far behind,” Griffiths said.
He said the U.N. World Food Program has recently been providing aid for up to 5.3 million Somalis, which is “a lot, but it’s going to get worse if famine comes.” He said 98% of the aid is given through cash distributions via telephones.
But many thousands are not getting help and hungry families in Somalia have been staggering for days or weeks through parched terrain in search of assistance.
Griffiths said a big challenge is to get aid to people before they move from their homes, to help avoid massive displacement.
Many Somalis raise livestock, which is key to their survival, but he said three million animals have died or been slaughtered because of the lack of rain.
“Continued drought, continued failure of rainy seasons, means that a generation’s way of life is under threat,” Griffiths said.
He said the international community needs to help Somalis find an alternative way of life and making a living, which will require development funding and funding to mitigate the impact of climate change.
Griffiths, a British diplomat, said the war in Ukraine has had an impact on humanitarian aid, with U.N. humanitarian appeals around the world receiving about 30% of the money needed on average.
“To those countries, which are traditionally very generous, my own included, and many others,” he said. “Please don’t forget Somalia. You didn’t in the past. You contributed wonderfully in the past. Please do so now.”
UN pleads for aid for Somalia, on the brink of famine
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The United Nations on Tuesday begged the international community not to forget Somalia, with the humanitarian affairs chief pleading for more aid as drought puts 200,000 people on the brink of famine.
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