The countries in the horn of Africa are projected to face another disastrous famine in the near future due to drought and food shortages. Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, and Uganda are experiencing the worst effects of climate change and the pandemic.
UNICEF says the region is on the verge of facing its worst drought in decades. Access to clean water, nutrition, education, health, and protection is lessening. Approximately a million children are at risk of severe malnutrition and are in need of medical treatment, with seven million facing acute malnutrition, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The United Nations (UN) is prioritizing the prevention of a health crisis over the food crisis, as the situation exacerbates. The organization is forced to make a choice of evil between a binary choice. The UN is requesting almost $124 million to combat the situation.
According to the UN News reports, Ibrahima Soce Fall, the WHO Assistant Director General for Emergency Reports said back in July, “the situation is already catastrophic, and we need to act now,..we cannot continue in this underfunding crisis.”
Displacement and malnutrition make the inhabitants of the region vulnerable to diseases and infections. The lack of access to vaccinations and the recent global COVID-19 dilemma halted necessary supplies to the countries facing the ongoing uncertainties. As the priority issue, “WHO is coordinating with partners in the health sector and beyond to ramp up its response in the region to avert the worst effects of food insecurity and to give people access to the health services they need.” To counter the outcome of malnutrition, the WHO is surveilling and assisting the affected nations to prepare for disease outbreaks like malaria, measles, and cholera.
WHO Incident Manager Sophie Maes said back in August, “there are now four seasons where the rain didn’t come as predicted and a fifth season is estimated to also fail. Places where there is drought the problem keeps worsening and worsening,…in other places like South Sudan, there have been three years of consecutive flooding with almost 40 per cent of the country being flooded. And we are looking at something that is going to get worse in the near future.”
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification scale (IPC3) shows that 37 million people are projected to reach the third out of the five phases of the scale. The phases escalate as: (1) Minimal/None, (2) Stressed, (3) Crisis, (4) Emergency, (5) Catastrophe/Famine.
The third phase of the IPC3 suggests that the population is only able to acquire its minimum food needs, by reducing or not attending to other essential livelihood assets through coping strategies.