Hunger in Somalia has doubled the number of children admitted at nutritional centres supported by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) even with the onset of the rainy season.
In Baidoa town, this nutritional centre is one of few facilities where malnourished children below five years of age can access treatment in south and central Somalia.
Baidoa hospital which hosts the nutritional clinic has recorded an increase in patients, which has stretched the hospital’s capacity far beyond its 150-bed limit.
Tents have been put up to accommodate more patients.
The centre has now admitted 230 children compared to the 100 children admitted the same time, last year.
Dominik Stillhart, the ICRC director of operations worldwide was recently in the country visiting facilities supported by the organisation.
“What we saw in the two nutrition centres that we are supporting in Kismayo and in Baidoa, is nearly double the number of children that have been admitted to these two centres, which is clearly the result of the severe food crisis that is currently affecting Somalia,” said Stillhart.
“I have a lot of pictures of children when they come in with very severe malnutrition, be it marasmus or kwashiorkor and the photos after that. The parents usually say; when we brought this child here he was dying,” said Suuldano, the nutrition centre supervisor at Baidoa Regional Hospital.
Suuldano, the nutrition centre supervisor at Baidoa Regional Hospital.
Across the country, the number of malnourished children at its stabilisation centres and those run by the Somali Red Crescent Society has shot up 80 percent, to 12,710.
Uncertainty about sufficient rainfall during the current Gu season (April – May) has raised fears that the effects of the drought will persist and the risk of the situation deteriorating further remains very real.
The rains began in parts of the country in the second week of April and have since spread to most areas. The rains will allow farmers to plant crops as well as grass for the livestock that sustain Somalia’s nomadic families, although the long drought has already wiped out livestock herds and forced many farmers to seek aid in cities.
In addition to food shortages, Somalia is experiencing a rapid spread of cholera, with more than 20,000 cases reported nationwide. The outbreak is expected to worsen due to the rainy season.
Six years ago, a devastating famine in the country led to the death of over a quarter million people, half of them children.
Half of the country’s 12 million citizens are expected to need aid by July according to agencies.
“We are aiming together at reaching up to 7 million people until the end of this year and we have an appeal for roughly 600,000,000 Swiss francs from our donors,” said Stillhart.”
Food shortages are worsened by fighting in some areas occupied by al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militants. But unlike in 2011, when al Shabaab’s restrictions on movement and its refusal to allow many aid groups access pushed up the death toll, the group is allowing people to move.
