After two consecutive seasons of poor rainfall leading to drought, Somalia is on the brink of another famine as 110 people, mostly women and children, died in the past 48 hours due to starvation and drought-related diseases.
The deaths came from the villages of southwestern Bay region, the ground-zero of this year's drought, while it was not yet established how many people had died in other parts of the country.
Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire announced the impending crises as he spoke before the drought committee. Four days earlier, the drought was declared as a national disaster by President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo.
The prime minister, in a statement released by his office, was warned by the committee "about the humanitarian crises ... that is threatening the lives of the people and their livestock."
Save Somalis From Dying
The severe drought that hit the country has put the lives of more than 6 million Somalis in danger as food and water become scarce with rivers drying up.
The present drought will "cost lives, further destroy livelihoods, and could undermine the pursuit of key state-building and peace-building initiatives," Peter de Clercq, United Nations's coordinator for Somalia, said. The country has been rocked by internal conflict for decades and beset with lack of infrastructure problem.
He sees the urgent need to "scale up the drought response immediately."
Khaire also called on the "business people and everyone to contribute to the drought response efforts aimed at saving the lives of the millions of Somalis dying from hunger and lack of water."
People Needing Assistance Growing
In September last year, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization, around 5 million Somalis were in need of assistance. The number went as high as 6.2 in this year's drought.
During the famine between 2010 and 2012, the United Nations and the United States Agency for International Development said the death toll had reached up to 258,000.
Somalia is placed along South Sudan, Nigeria, and Yemen by UNICEF where an estimated 1.4 million children are vulnerable from the impending famine to hit the region.
Slow Response?
The United Nations and several aid agencies have developed a five-level scale called the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) as a guide to classify different phases on food security situations. In Phase 5 of the IPC, a famine or humanitarian catastrophe is declared if more than two people die every day, more than 30 percent acute malnutrition rates are recorded, all livestock have died, food consumption is less than 2,100 kilocalories, and less than 4 liters of water is available for each person.
Based on these criteria, by the time the United Nations declares a famine, there is already a widespread loss of lives.
