Somalians are suffering from the impact of the worst drought in a decade, as well as persistent insecurity in a lawless state awash with weapons.
• 750,000 still displaced after civil war
Severe drought affected 2 million
4 doctors per 100,000 people
Somalia is emerging from the grip of its worst drought in a decade, with 2 million people requiring emergency food and medical relief. Rain has finally arrived, but there is still an acute need for aid to support people before the harvest and to help recovery.
Delivering aid is a dangerous and costly business in a country where anarchy reigns. Aid workers have to negotiate pirates, ambushes and endless checkpoints manned by gunmen.
More than a year after an interim government was set up, inter-clan fighting continues, arms flow freely despite a U.N. arms embargo, and there are no functioning public services.
The fighting has displaced thousands, with an estimated 750,000 people still uprooted. Many have fled overseas or are living in squalid conditions in the capital Mogadishu.
KEY FACTS
| Total population (2003) |
9.9 million (WHO) |
| Life expectancy (2003) |
46.2 (UNDP 2005) |
| Internally displaced people |
400,000 (UNHCR 2006) |
| Refugees |
350,000 (UNHCR 2006) |
| People in need of emergency health care |
2 million (WHO 2006) |
| People in need of food aid |
1.7 million (WFP 2006) |
| Doctors per 100,000 people |
4 (UNDP 2005) |
| Population with access to safe water |
30 percent (UNICEF) |
| Population at risk of malaria |
87 percent (UNICEF) |
| Children stunted |
23 percent (UNDP 2005) |
| Under-five death rate |
225 per 1,000 live births (UNICEF) |
| Children attending primary school |
Boys - 13 percent; Girls - 7 percent (UNICEF) |
| Number of polio cases |
200 (WHO, March 2006) |
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