The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
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    Somalia Famine

    By David Seaton on Wed, 07/20/2011 - 2:37pm |

    According to the UN, more than six out of every 10,000 people are dying of hunger every day in some parts of the Bakool and Lower Shabelle regions of Somalia, with more than half the children there suffering from acute malnutrition. This is far above the normal famine threshold of two deaths per 10,000 people a day, and 30% malnutrition levels, UN agencies say. Guardian

    Let's see what the "International Community" comes up with on this one.

     

    Comments

    Six deaths per day per 10,000 people sounds almost (hard to find the word) manageable. Assuming conditions don't get even worse.

    Until you realize we are talking about a permanent condition. These are pastoral people, and all their animals are already dead, hopefully eaten. It wouldn't matter anyway, since the rains won't come for two or three months -- if they come at all. The animals that weren't dead now would be by then.

    Project the current death rate a full year, and nearly one-quarter of these refugees will die. Without food aid (an unimaginable idea), all of them will.

    One hopeful sign: the Islamist al-Shabaab insurgents that control the affected areas have offered a truce so aid workers can get in. They're probably starving too.

    Western governments will act only if we citizens demand that they do.

     


    by acanuck on Wed, 07/20/2011 - 6:28pm

    Thanks for bringing this to the table David.  Here's a link to an article in the LA Times on this tragic situation. 

     


    by Bruce Levine on Wed, 07/20/2011 - 6:37pm

    http://www.charity-charities.org/Somalia-charities/Beletwayne.html

    I dunno I was going to check out charities already set up.

    Then I found this old report dated 1994:

    http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNABZ357.pdf

    Helpless, helpless, helpless.
     


    by Richard Day on Thu, 07/21/2011 - 3:02am