East Africa Children face malnutrition

World Health Organization has warned that the movement of people and poor sanitation in overcrowded camps and towns is increasing the risk of cholera, typhoid and measles epidemics.UNICEF, said 65,000 children in Kenya alone are at acute risk of dying a threefold increase since 2009. In Somalia, the agency said, one in six children are now dying before their fifth birthday.

East Africa Children are suffering the worst effects of malnutrition and exhaustion on the long foot journeys through the sunbaked region in search of food.Thousands of Somalis are arriving at the Dadaab camp in neighboring Kenya each week, he said. The camp, already the world's largest, has swelled to hold almost 400,000 in recent months. Others are fleeing to nearby Ethiopia, where conditions are increasingly chaotic.

Adrian Edwards, a spokesman for the United Nations refugee agency, said the UN is unable to say how many people are on the move in East Africa right now but "we don't see things turning a corner yet.""We are in a situation where we are struggling to keep up with the volume of new arrivals," Edwards told reporters in Geneva.

Head of the World Food Programme has asked for urgent funding to help fight hunger in the Horn of Africa as the worst drought in a decade continues to devastate the region.
A statement yesterday by WFP called on donors to help cover nearly 190 million dollar budget gap for operations that includes providing food to a growing refugee population in Kenya and Ethiopia. Nearly 11 million people in the Horn of Africa are confronting the worst drought in decades and need urgent assistance to stay alive, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Tuesday.

He urged donors to immediately support the $1.6 billion appeal by UN agencies to pay for life-saving programs in the region, saying only half that amount has been received so far."The human cost of this crisis is catastrophic," he told reporters. "We cannot afford to wait." Ban said he called an emergency meeting Tuesday morning with the heads of UN agencies to discuss the worsening drought in East Africa, which along with fighting in Somalia has created a humanitarian crisis.