UNICEF warning: over 100,000 Ethiopian children could starve

The agency The United Nations for children (UNICEF) said on Friday that more than 100,000 children in Ethiopia’s northern region of Tigray could suffer life-threatening malnutrition over the next 12 months, which amounts to multiplying the usual figures by 10.

UNICEF spokesperson Marixie Mercado said that one in two pregnant and breastfeeding women screened in Tigray suffered from severe malnutrition. “Our worst fears concerning the health and well-being of children (…) are confirmed,” he said during a briefing in Geneva.

Spokesman for the Prime Minister and a government working group on Tigray, where fighting between regional and federal rebel forces has continued since NovemberThey did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the UNICEF statement.

Babies like 20-month-old Aammanuel Merhawi suffer the most. Her weight is a third less than normal for her age. His feverish eyes glow and his ribs are visible as he vomits extra food from a nasal tube. All of them are signs of severe malnutrition.

“My milk has dried up,” her mother, Brkti Gebrehiwot, told Reuters at Wukro General Hospital in northern Tigray on July 11.

Famine conditions

Aid agencies say they’re about to stay without the formula used to treat 4,000 severely malnourished children each month. At least three children have died in Wukro hospital since February, nurse Tsehaynesh Gebrehiwot said.

The health care provider provided his medical records: Awet Gebreslassie, four months old, weighed 2.6 kilograms, one third of his normal weight; One year old Robel Gebrezgiher weighed 2 kilograms, less than a quarter of his normal weight; and Kisanet Hogus, also one year old, weighed 5 kilograms, just over half of her normal weight. All of them died a few days after their admission.

At the General Hospital of Adigrat, further north, Reuters saw medical records confirming the deaths of three other malnourished children. Doctors at both hospitals said they saw four to ten severely malnourished children per month before conflict erupts in November. Now the numbers have more than doubled.

According to the UN, some 400,000 people live in conditions of famine in Tigray and more than 90% of the population is in need of emergency food aid.

In a statement on Thursday evening, the Ethiopian government accused regional forces in Tigray of blocking aid and said it had stored reserve wheat in the region. He did not give details on the location of the reserves or on the distribution plans.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Tigray was not available for comment, but previously said it appreciated the help.

The UN says Tigray needs 100 food trucks a day to avoid massive famine. Only a convoy of 50 trucks passed last month.

With information from Reuters