East Africa Famine: SOS Children expands Emergency Relief in Somalia
SOS Children have already launched an Emergency Relief Programme for families and children living in and around Somalia's capital Mogadishu. Now, we are expanding our operations into the Al Shabab-controlled city of Baidoa. As one of the only aid agencies with permission to operate here, our work is saving lives.
Following the worst drought in 60 years, millions of people in East Africa are struggling to survive. In addition to our relief efforts in Mogadishu in Somalia, we are now setting up operations in the city of Baidoa.
Aside from SOS Children, there are currently very few humanitarian organisations operating in Baidoa. The region is controlled by Al Shabab, a group opposing the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia. Although Al Shabab have lifted the ban on organisations who are interested in supporting drought-affected families in the region, most NGOs are sceptical of their sincerity and have not yet set up operations here.
Over two years of rain failure has devastated lives and livelihoods of rural communities in the Bay region of Somalia. Desperate to survive, thousands of drought affected families from all over the Bay and Bakool regions in central Somalia have moved south to the city of Baidoa in search of food and medical care. Currently, there are two large refugee camps on the outskirts of the town with approximately between 40,000 and 48,000 displaced people living in this area.
SOS Children have already carried out an assessment of the situation in Baidoa to determine the needs of the families living there. The assessment found that families living in the two camps lack medical support. The main hospital in Baidoa is over-stretched and ten children have died in the camps in the last two days as a result of diarrhoea alone.
Families have hardly any shelter in the camps. Most families (each of about 8 people) live in small huts measuring less than 2 by 3 meters covered with tattered clothes. The huts hardly shelter the families from the sun’s heat during the day and extreme cold during the night during this season.
Access to food for the displaced families is also severely inadequate, with only two organisations currently distributing food in the camps. A number of the displaced families often sleep in Baidoa town and beg to survive.
Emergency Relief for families in Baidoa
SOS Children are currently preparing the Emergency Relief Programme in Baidoa, which will include:
- The provision of food rations for approximately 2,500 families
- Establishing a mobile clinic in the camp, which will provide specialist mother and child health services, treat patients with common diseases and provide essential drugs, as well as health and nutritional education
- Running an immunisation programs to protect children from diseases such as measles, which are highly contagious in densely populated camps
- Establishing a therapeutic feeding centre to improve nutritional services for children. This includes providing basic nutrition supplies and equipment as well as staff training.
How you can help
You can make a one-off donation directly to our Emergency Relief Programme in Somalia, or take out a child sponsorship to help us to focus on the long-term welfare of children who have no one to care for them as a result of the famine.
Right in the middle of the increasing humanitarian crisis in the horn of Africa you will find SOS Children working where we have been working for decades. As always, we are there before the crisis starts, and still there long after the TV cameras have gone home.
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