'Children are drinking urine'
2006-02-16 22:37
Nairobi - At least seven people have died of dehydration in Somalia over the past month as severe water shortages from a killer regional drought force many to drink their own urine, an aid agency said on Thursday.
In neighboring Kenya, the drought-related death toll of at least 40 rose as police said four women in a desperate hunt for water were killed when the wall of a well collapsed on top of them.
Oxfam International said communities in southern and central Somalia were living in searing 40°C heat with only three glasses a day per person for drinking, washing and cooking.
Abdullahi Maalim Hussein, a Somali elder who accompanied a recent Oxfam assessment mission to the worst-hit areas, said: "The situation is as bad as I can remember.
"Some people are dying and children are drinking their own urine because there is simply no water available for them to drink."
Oxfam said the tiny amount of water available, for which many families have to walk up to 70km to get, is one-twentieth of the daily supply recommended by minimum humanitarian standards.
"Swift action needed"
The group's assessment mission said at least seven people and potentially many more had already died from drought-related dehydration since mid-January and that the number would almost certainly rise even with emergency aid.
Oxfam's regional programme manager Mohamed Elmi said: "The situation will get worse unless swift action is taken. People cannot survive on just three glasses of water a day when the temperature is hitting 40°C."
The drought threatens millions across east Africa, 1.7 of whom live in anarchic Somalia where relief operations are hampered by rampant insecurity, war-shattered infrastructure and a lack of even the most basic services.