Via The Guardian: 'Falling off a cliff': pandemic crippling world's most fragile states, finds report. Excerpt:
Thousands could starve in the world’s most fragile states as the pandemic comes on top of existing crises, warns a new report today which found aid workers are deeply pessimistic about the coming year.
The survey of aid workers by the Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC) found that they believed humanitarian conditions were at their worst in a decade.
The chief executive of the DEC, Saleh Saeed, said reduced funding could force aid providers to prioritise some populations and services over others.
“People living in places made perilous by conflict, violence and climate disasters are coping with the coronavirus pandemic as best they can, but the odds are stacked against them. The knock-on effects of the pandemic have crippled economies, making the world’s poorest people even poorer,” said Saeed.
The report focused on Syria, Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Afghanistan, as well as the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh.
It said there had been a significant economic impact in all of these countries, but that the direct health impact of the coronavirus had also been underestimated because of insufficient testing capacity.
Ahmed Khalif, country director for the charity Action Against Hunger in Somalia, said livelihoods had been damaged by drops in crucial livestock exports and remittances sent from the diaspora, coming alongside conflict, locust infestations and drought.
