Baylor College of Medicine
The 2014–15 Ebola outbreak occurred in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone not from coincidence but because these three countries suffered from catastrophic breakdowns in health systems due to years of atrocities and civil wars, together with forced human migrations and deforestation. A similar set of circumstances has now been identified in ISIS-occupied conflict zones in the Middle East and North Africa, suggesting that this region as well might be the next “shoe to fall” in terms of serious infectious diseases outbreaks. The same may now also be true for the troubled nation of Somalia.
The Federal Republic of Somalia is roughly the geographic size of Texas and located on the horn of Africa.
Today, the estimated 10.6 million people of Somalia live in one of the worst-performing economies in Africa, a situation that is exacerbated by frequent droughts and dust storms as a result of climate change. According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), more than 60% of Somalia’s population lives in severe poverty, and almost three-quarters of the population lives either in severe poverty or in near poverty. One-third of Somalia’s children under the age of five are underweight. Although a human development index (HDI) has not yet been calculated for Somalia because of an absence of quality data, there is every reason to believe that Somalia would be comparable to some of the worst-performing nations on the African continent.
For example, the life expectancy at birth in Somalia is 52 years, approximately the same as the three African countries listed at the bottom of the HDI scale—Chad, Central African Republic (CAR), and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Similar to the situation in Somalia, civil warfare and instability have made it difficult for humanitarian aid to reach people in need in Chad, CAR, and DRC. For example, according to Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) International, “DRC’s successive wars have had a severe impact on the health infrastructure and government-funded services.” Humanitarian groups have been limited in providing health care and other basic needs to the people in CAR because of “looting of warehouses and aid convoys, threats to aid workers, and general insecurity…”
Read the full article in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases.
