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With the worst drought in 60 years underway and famine ravaging East Africa, families and children in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya need life-saving aid in this crisis. According to the United Nations, over 12.4 million people are facing starvation, with entire families and communities abandoning their homes in desperate search of food and water.

Help is on the way.

SOS Children’s Villages have had a long-standing presence in East Africa. Over the past several weeks we have built on our initial relief efforts and have launched a full response in Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya.

In Somalia, most of the children and elderly in the displaced camps in and around Mogadishu are malnourished, and most children have not been vaccinated against immunisable diseases. There is the threat of a measles epidemic, as well as diarrhea, respiratory infections, malaria and skin disorders. In the past few weeks, SOS clinics have treated thousands of people in these camps, half of them children under the age of five.

In Ethiopia, SOS Children’s Villages is providing disaster relief in the Gode region. Gode lies in one of the driest areas of Ethiopia. Thanks to the existing infrastructure and expertise of SOS Children's Villages co-workers, we are able to provide relief aid in this location for mothers and their children. The plan is to distribute food and put sustainable development measures in place to secure families' survival in the long term.

In Kenya, two 10 ton trucks full of relief food has arrived safely in the Marasabit district, which has been particularly affected by the raging drought: schools have been closed and thousands of  children have now joined their parents in search of food and water.  Food distribution has already started in schools already.

In the days and weeks to come, SOS Children’s Villages will set up more medical centres in other, equally crowded refugee camps in Somalia. In Kenya and Ethiopia, preparations to transport more desperately needed supplies of food, water and medication to heavily affected areas are under way.

SOS Somalia staff are ready and able ot help today

The long-standing relationships between SOS emergency relief teams and government authorities as well as other influential groups have allowed for swift and unbureaucratic aid to the children and families who need it most.

We need to let children and families throughout East Africa to know that help is on the way. Please donate now to help SOS Children’s Villages offer urgently needed aid to those who are most vulnerable.