Flood-related diseases, HIV/AIDS reverse rainfall gains

Adequate rainfall in the last three months of 2006 improved food security in the parts of Kenya affected by the severe drought that hit the Horn of Africa last year, a famine warning agency reported.

However, in some areas, outbreaks of diseases related to floods, as well as high HIV/AIDS prevalence, reversed the gains of a good harvest and pasture regeneration.

"Food security indicators have improved in the previously drought-affected livelihoods. Food prices are declining after a good long-rains harvest, livestock prices have risen in most markets," the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS Net) said in a report released on 22 March.

Above-normal October-December rains caused devastating floods in northern and eastern pastoral areas, the Indian Ocean coastal region and the lakeshore areas of western Kenya, resulting in deaths and damaged infrastructure and crops. The floods led to the outbreak of diseases, notably Rift Valley Fever (RVF), which caused economic hardship to pastoralists when the government imposed a ban on the slaughter and movement of livestock from the RVF-affected areas in a bid to control the outbreak, according to the report.

"Significant improvements in food security were reversed by the upsurge in vector and water-borne diseases especially malaria, diarrhoea, measles and cholera. Over 150 persons lost their lives to RVF in pastoral districts and an additional four people died as a result of cholera in Moyale District," according to FEWS Net.

Localised crop losses caused by floods in the Lake Victoria lowland areas caused food insecurity in some places, despite higher-than-normal aggregate production for key crops in the region, the report said.

About 40,000 people were affected by the floods through displacement, loss of household and productive assets, and loss of livelihood, especially through crop damage and livestock losses.

The report also noted that the high prevalence of HIV/AIDS in the Lake region continues to undermine food security in the area.

"Underlying rising food insecurity is the high prevalence rates of HIV/AIDS that range between 14 percent in Migori to 35 percent in Suba. Out of 152,000 school-aged children in Siaya District - where HIV/AIDS prevalence is 29 percent, 37,000, or 25 percent, are orphans, due primarily to the pandemic," the report said. "The HIV/AIDS pandemic is a growing humanitarian crisis especially in the Lake region, requiring much greater emphasis than is the case currently," it added.

The report recommended increased livestock vaccination against RVF, foot and mouth disease, East Coast fever and lumpy skin disease, and rehabilitation of irrigation facilities, dykes, roads and toilets before the long rains at end-March. Tree-planting along the flood zones would reduce the potential degradation of land when rains are above normal, FEWS Net said.

There was also a need to systematically deal with the effects of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, especially in the Lake region, the FEWS Net report said, adding that the school-feeding programme should be expanded in areas where rates of child malnutrition remain high.

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