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Rapid Mass MUAC Screening in Baidoa, September 2022

Countries
Somalia
Sources
Action Against Hunger
+ 3 more
Publication date

Background

A series of failed rainy seasons, extremely higher commodity prices, and recurring conflicts resulting in severe drought in Somalia, forced more than 805,000 persons to flee from their settlements as of October 2021. The Interagency Standing Committee (IASC) principals acknowledged activating humanitarian system-wide Scale-Up for Somalia on the 11th of August 2022, declaring that Somalia is on the brink of famine. In general, the Bay and Bakool regions are the most affected ones in the country.

Baidoa district in the Bay region is believed to be the most affected district by the current drought. The district is hosting the second largest number of displaced person country wide after Mogadishu. Over the next 6 months, Somalia IASC recommended that the focus of emergency response will be on urgent priority life-saving interventions. Among the 6 immediate priority actions is the Scale-up of food and nutritional support to respond to increasing rates of malnutrition and food insecurity amongst IDPs and vulnerable rural communities requiring both treatment of SAM and MAM as well as malnutrition prevention actions for the most vulnerable Under-5 children and Pregnant and Lactating Women (PLWs). According to the analysis of admission and screening trends from January to August this year, the number of children screened and admitted to the nutrition sites in Baidoa continued to increase regularly.