Author: WHES Team

Hurricane Matthew makes old problems worse for Haitians

The first reports to arrive were of vast flooding and destruction, rivers of brown water pulsing through streets and homes shorn of tin roofs. Eventually, the talk turned to livestock lost, a veritable fortune for those living in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

The storm left a broad tableau of devastation: houses pummeled into timber, crops destroyed and stretches of towns and villages under several feet of water. In the southern city of Jérémie, 80 percent of the buildings were destroyed.

See full story at “http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/07/world/americas/hurricane-matthew-haiti.html

In South Sudan, mothers are so hungry many can no longer breast-feed

Weeks after the outbreak of deadly fighting in South Sudan, aid groups say their movement is being restricted by continued violence and government checkpoints, harming their ability to get food and medicine to severely malnourished children.  “We already have an extremely serious food-insecurity crisis,” said U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Stephen O’Brien in an interview. “And there are many circumstances where, appallingly, this only gets worse.”…O’Brien said that during a trip to South Sudan this week, he met with mothers unable to breast-feed their babies because they themselves were not getting enough food.