“We just buried Mom. Can you believe it? She was too young to die. I can’t take her place for my younger siblings.”

These are the painful words of my 17-year-old cousin, Sima, who had just lost her mother a few hours before we spoke. My Aunt Bibi was only 40 years old. She lived in Ghazni province in southeastern Afghanistan. She died from uterine bleeding caused by an infection. The doctors in Ghazni’s provincial hospital told her they didn’t have the medicine or facilities to treat her, and she should go to Kabul or abroad. She couldn’t do either.

Gul Ahmad, who lives in Ghor province and whose 5-year-old son died from diarrhea last week, had a similar story: “The doctors told me that they were out of medicine, and I must take my son to a larger clinic.” He didn’t have the money to take his son to another clinic, and the child died.