Somalis drink urine as drought kills from dehydration AFP Friday February 17, 2006 http://sg.news.yahoo.com/060216/1/3ypwo.html
Dehydration has killed at least seven people in Somalia in the past month as severe water shortages from an east African drought force many to drink their own urine. In neighboring Kenya, the drought-related death toll of at least 40 rose as police said four women on a desperate hunt for water were killed in the collapse of a nearly dry well in the parched northwest. And in both countries, along with Ethiopia, a veterinary charity warned that livestock face complete "decimation," further threatening pastoralist populations without urgent action. In southern and central Somalia Oxfam International said communities were living in searing 40-degree centigrade (104 Fahrenheit) heat with only three glasses a day per person for drinking, washing and cooking. "The situation is as bad as I can remember," said Abdullahi Maalim Hussein on Thursday, a Somali elder who accompanied a recent Oxfam assessment mission to the worst-hit areas. "Some people are dying and children are drinking their own urine because there is simply no water available for them to drink," he said in a statement released in Nairobi by the British-based group. The tiny amount of water available, for which many families have to walk up to 70 kilometers (45 miles) to get, is one-twentieth of the daily supply recommended by minimum humanitarian standards, Oxfam said. 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. "The situation will get worse unless swift action is taken," said Mohamed Elmi, Oxfam's regional program manager. "People cannot survive on just three glasses of water a day when the temperature is hitting 40 degrees." The drought threatens millions across east Africa, 1.7 of whom live in lawless Somalia where relief operations are hampered by rampant insecurity, war-shattered infrastructure and a lack of even the most basic services. Of the Somalis at risk, Oxfam said about 200,000 living along the Kenya-Somalia border in the Gedo and Lower Juba regions are in dire need of urgent water supplies. About eight million people in four east African countries, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, are now in need of food assistance to stave off drought-related starvation. Livestock-dependent pastoralist communities that live in the affected areas have been hardest hit as cattle, goats and camels die in unprecendented numbers from hunger and thirst. Many international appeals for aid have focused on dire shortages of food and animal fodder, but Oxfam said the lack of drinking water in Somalia was critical. "As well as food, these communities desperately need water," it said. "Without water children will die, and the livestock on which pastoralists depend will end up as rotting corpses around dry wells." In Kenya's northwest Turkana district, dried up rivers and barren boreholes led the deaths of the four women, including two sisters, in the well collapse late last week in a remote area near the Kenyan-Sudanese border, police said. "They were buried alive on Friday after the sands of the well caved in," Turkana Police Commander Julius Muli told AFP, adding that his office had not learned of the collapse until Monday. "Water shortage here is a big problem." In northeast Kenya, the British-based Society for the Protection of Animals Abroad (SPANA) said that 90 percent of donkeys, 70 percent of cattle and 60 percent of camels have perished since the drought began to bite. Without urgent action, it said livestock throughout the region "face decimation" as it launched a drive to provide emergency fodder for the animals. http://sg.news.yahoo.com/060216/1/3ypwo.html ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Join modern day disciples reach the disfigured and poor with hope and healing http://us.click.yahoo.com/lMct6A/Vp3LAA/i1hLAA/TXWolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> *************************************************************************** {Invite (mankind, O Muhammad ) to the Way of your Lord (i.e. Islam) with wisdom (i.e. with the Divine Inspiration and the Qur'an) and fair preaching, and argue with them in a way that is better. Truly, your Lord knows best who has gone astray from His Path, and He is the Best Aware of those who are guided.} (Holy Quran-16:125) {And who is better in speech than he who [says: "My Lord is Allah (believes in His Oneness)," and then stands straight (acts upon His Order), and] invites (men) to Allah's (Islamic Monotheism), and does righteous deeds, and says: "I am one of the Muslims."} (Holy Quran-41:33) The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: "By Allah, if Allah guides one person by you, it is better for you than the best types of camels." [al-Bukhaaree, Muslim] The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) also said, "Whoever calls to guidance will have a reward similar to the reward of the one who follows him, without the reward of either of them being lessened at all." [Muslim, Ahmad, Aboo Daawood, an-Nasaa'ee, at-Tirmidhee, Ibn Maajah] -------------------------------------------------------------------------- All views expressed herein belong to the individuals concerned and do not in any way reflect the official views of IslamCity unless sanctioned or approved otherwise. If your mailbox clogged with mails from IslamCity, you may wish to get a daily digest of emails by logging-on to http://www.yahoogroups.com to change your mail delivery settings or email the moderators at [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the title "change to daily digest". Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/islamcity/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
