Hundreds die as Somalia faces famine ｜Ground Report

A devastating drought is displacing thousands of families in the Horn of Africa and killing vulnerable and weak children.

In hospitals and camps for the displaced near Somalia's capital, mothers hold on to their frail and squalling children.

Many have had to walk long distances to find help.

At one overflowing camp on the outskirts of Mogadishu, recent arrivals were clearly anguished as they described watching family members die and leaving vulnerable loved ones behind.

Amina Abdi Hassan came from a village in southern Somalia.

She says she walked with her children and was forced to leave some behind, including a severely malnourished baby.

She's still hungry, even in the capital, as aid runs dry.

"Many others are on their way," she warns.

More people come every day, using the last wisps of energy to set up makeshift shelters in the dust, lashing together branches with bits of fabric and plastic.

Some earlier arrivals walked up to 19 days to reach the capital, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council.

Famine now even threatens Somalia's capital as the camps on the city's outskirts swell with exhausted new arrivals.

One malnutrition treatment centre is filled with anxious mothers and their malnourished children.

Owliyo Hassan Salaad watched four of her children die this year, one by one victims of the drought in the Horn of Africa.

Now she cradles her frail and squalling three-year-old, Ali Osman, whom she carried on a 90-kilometer (55-mile) walk from her village to Somalia's capital.

Desperate not to lose him, too, she can barely speak about the small bodies buried back home in soil too dry for planting.

Admissions at the centre more than doubled in May to 122 patients.

At least 30 people died this year through April at the centre and six others, run by the Action Against Hunger, according to data the humanitarian group shared with The Associated Press.

It is seeing the highest admission rates to its hunger treatment centres since it began working in Somalia in 1992, with admissions of severely malnourished children up 55% from last year.

More broadly, at least 448 people died at outpatient and in-patient malnutrition treatment centres across Somalia this year through April.

That figure is based on previously unreported data compiled by humanitarian groups and local authorities and shared with the AP.

The overall death toll from the drought remains elusive.

Many more people are dying beyond the notice of authorities, as aid workers warn the data is incomplete and often comes in late.

One notable complication in counting deaths is the extremist group al-Shabab, whose control over large parts of southern and central Somalia is a barrier to aid.

The group's harsh and neglectful response to Somalia's drought-driven famine from 2010-12 was one factor in the deaths of more than a quarter-million people, half of them children.

Another factor was the international community's slow response.

Now the alarms are sounding again.

More than 200,000 people in Somalia face "catastrophic hunger and starvation, a drastic increase from the 81,000 forecast in April," a joint statement by UN agencies said on Monday.

They noted that a humanitarian response plan for this year was just 18% funded.

Somalia isn't alone.

In Ethiopia's drought-affected regions, the number of children treated for the most severe malnutrition has jumped 15% since the same period last year, according to UNICEF data shared with AP.

More than 5,000 children aged under five in the country's Somali region were found to have the most severe malnutrition in April.

Meanwhile, aid rations have been reduced because of resource shortages.

And weekly admissions for severe malnutrition treatment are steadily growing, "a tip of the crisis," UNICEF says.

In Kenya, the aid group Doctors Without Borders reported at least 11 deaths in a single county's malnutrition treatment programme over a monthlong period earlier this year.