Little Nasro, two, is so dehydrated she cannot produce tears. For seven long days her devoted mother Samiro has kept a bedside vigil at a hospital in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital.
Hungry and helpless …this is Nasro, the baby who is unable to cry.
The two-year-old is so dehydrated she cannot produce tears. Nasro is among four million facing crisis levels of hunger in wartorn Somalia. Her mum Samiro tells us: “She hasn’t smiled in months.”
Helpless Nasro lays a hand across her head and lets out a plaintive cry… yet she physically can’t shed a tear. The malnourished toddler is too gripped by dehydration. She hasn’t smiled in months. Her gaunt frame tips the scales at barely more than a stone – just twice the weight of an average newborn.
For seven long days her devoted mother Samiro has kept a bedside vigil at the intensive care unit in Banadir Hospital’s stabilisation centre in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital. Nasro is fed via a nasal tube. Samiro, 25, tells us: “Every time when I was with my daughter day and night I was praying for her to recover… I don’t sleep. The last time I saw her smiling was June. Since then she was feeling dizzy, sick.”
Nasro’s plight encapsulates the pain of an entire nation. The impoverished country in East Africa has been ravaged by decades of war and the Islamist terror group Al-Shabaab controls vast swathes of territory. But an old and equally deadly threat has returned: Drought… leading to crippling hunger.
A catastrophe is unfolding before the world’s eyes. Crops have failed, livestock has perished. As countries around the globe grapple with the impact of the climate crisis, Somalia has endured its worst drought on record.
Research has found climate change has increased the severity of drought in the Horn of Africa. It is estimated such droughts have become 100 times more likely. After a summer of wildfires across Europe, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has controversially watered down key UK climate policies.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/tragedy-baby-who-cant-even-31073850
