Aid group fears over 1,000 Afghan child deaths

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More than 1,000 Afghan children may have died of cold-related illnesses in a snow-bound Afghan province and the toll could rise if more relief supplies are not sent quickly, an international aid group said on Friday.

Survey teams sent to 16 villages in a single district of Ghor province this week recorded an average of five deaths of children under five in each, most in the past two weeks, said Paul Hicks, director for Catholic Relief Services in western Afghanistan.

He said CRS feared the toll in Shahrak district could be far higher as most of its 250 villages could not be reached because routes were blocked by snow. Two other districts with a similar number of villages were also inaccessible by road, he said.

“I’d say several hundred and perhaps more children have died, and perhaps more children will die if they cannot get access to medicines and other relief supplies,” Hicks said. “Our fear is that more than 1,000 deaths could be a conservative estimate.”

Ikramuddin Rezazada, the deputy governor of Ghor province, said the government in the provincial capital of Chaghcharan had so far confirmed 136 deaths, mostly of children, in four districts - Shahrak, Tulak, Sargar and Tuera.

He said the province-wide toll could be around 300.

Rezazada said the government had recorded 35 child deaths in Shahrak in the past three days, but the number could be higher. The deaths were caused by illnesses including whooping cough and measles, he said.

Another 39 deaths have been reported in Herat province, bringing the number of fatalities attributed to cold weather throughout Afghanistan in the past month to more than 200.

“We cannot get in touch with other districts far from Chaghcharan. We need the government to send in aid by air, otherwise Ghor will face a big disaster,” Rezazada said.

Hicks said there was a need for helicopter flights to the snow-bound districts of Tulak and Sargar to assess the extent of the emergency and bring in relief supplies.

Maarten Roest, spokesman for the U.N.’s World Food Programme, said it was seeking the help of the U.S. military to fly in 20 tonnes of emergency food supplies each to Shahrak and Tulak.

He said trucks carrying of 140 tonnes of food had been unable to reach the districts because of heavy snow.

“We are trying to find out where food is needed and how we can get it there as quickly as possible,” he said. “This is a very severe winter where the food needs of people at risk are rising.”

Afghanistan has received snowfall throughout the country this winter following several years of drought.

Hicks said Ghor had been particularly badly hit by the drought and the winter conditions were the worst officials could remember for many years. 

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