In one clinic cases of SAM – the most extreme form of malnutrition – increased nearly fourfold between June 2023 and June 2024, new data shows.[2] SAM shuts down children’s immune systems and makes otherwise non-life-threatening conditions like diarrhea potentially lethal.
The surge in SAM cases comes amid more than 15 months of conflict. The conflict has killed and injured thousands of children, forced many into child labour, destroyed healthcare and education, upended food systems, and created the world’s worst child displacement crisis with 6.7 million children forced from their homes.[3]
Displaced people are now overwhelming health facilities, turning up starving, sick and exhausted. Save the Children staff are seeing an increase in conditions such as acute respiratory infections (ARI), which can be caused and exacerbated by malnutrition.[4]
“IDPs (internally displaced people) have lost all basic needs due to conflict, they can only eat inadequate food, and most children show signs of exhaustion, fatigue, severe wasting and illness,” says Munir,* a health and nutrition manager for Save the Children in South Kordofan.
“I saw schools, mosques, public institutions, villages, and some roads in cities full of displaced people sleeping in plastic sheets without mattresses or beds. Many of them complain of chronic diseases and high costs of medicine and food, and some of them depend for food on subsidies from charitable people or organisations, but the aid is not enough,” Munir explains.
Child labour is rampant as families are forced to take desperate measures to get their hands on whatever food they can to stay alive, with children toiling in temperatures as high as 45 degrees Celsius. In Central Darfur, Save the Children staff have come across children who have been completely separated from their parents and are now working in a local market.[5]
“In Sudan, time is running out to keep children alive. And yet parties to the conflict and those with international influence have failed to put an end to the fighting over and over again,” says Dr Arif Noor, Country Director of Save the Children in Sudan.
“We have been saying it for 15 months and we will keep saying it until we no longer need to – it is time for an immediate and lasting ceasefire, and for a mammoth surge of support for the 14 million children in Sudan whose lives have been shattered,” says Dr Noor.
The humanitarian response for Sudan is significantly underfunded, with donors contributing just 32.3% to a UN response plan. Save the Children is calling for an immediate ceasefire and meaningful progress towards a lasting peace agreement.
Save the Children has worked in Sudan since 1983 and is currently supporting children and their families across Sudan providing health, nutrition, education, child protection and food security and livelihoods support. Save the Children is also supporting refugees from Sudan in Egypt and South Sudan.
*Name has been changed to protect anonymity.
[1] In a clinic in South Kordofan state, the planned annual target for treating SAM in children under 5 was 1474 cases, and during June 2024 Save the Children staff admitted 1457 SAM cases in children under 5. Out of this total 626 SAM cases have been treated, cured, and discharged, and 831 SAM cases are still receiving treatment.
[2] In one clinic, admissions for SAM in children was 395 in June and 1457 in June 2024.
[3] Save the Children analysis of latest IOM data shows an estimated 6.7 million children are displaced either internally or across borders. DTM Sudan Mobility
[4] The total number of ARI cases during January-June 2023 in Save the Children’s health facilities in South Kordofan was 28,279 cases, of which 19,775 (70%) were children. In 2024, cases increased to 32,989 cases, of which 23,070 (70%) were children.
[5] Save the Children staff registered these children in case management and are now working to respond to their needs.