What happened, where and when?

The burden of malnutrition has been a major public health concern in Afghanistan for decades due to intricate, underlying, and immediate causes including prolonged drought, natural shocks, displacement of populations, sudden rise in the cost of living, food insecurity and massive unemployment.

Although the aforementioned factors have been insidiously contributing to malnutrition over years, the situation deteriorated significantly between May and September 2024, when levels of malnutrition reached unprecedented and alarming levels, calling for concerted, lifesaving, humanitarian efforts. There was a sudden spike in the trends of acute malnutrition among children and pregnant and lactating women across the country. This trend on the field has been further confirmed and validated with the release of the 2024 Global Hunger Index on the 10 of October 2024, highlighting that the malnutrition and hunger situation in Afghanistan has further deteriorated, with news reports indicating the worsening of situation due to factors such as increasing in humanitarian need with the decrease seen in humanitarian funding. While this affects the entire country, Kandahar and Paktika provinces were among the worst affected provinces in Afghanistan. The situation and fatalities are expected to deteriorate further with the onset of the winter season hence the need to reduce acute hunger before its peak in December and February to avoid significant loss of lives.