Nearly 650 Die From Starvation During War In South Sudan

At least 646 people have died of starvation in shelters for people fleeing fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the Nuba Mountains, local authorities said.

Authorities from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N), a major armed group based in this mountain range in South Kordofan state and fighting alongside the paramilitaries, also said more than 52,000 people were facing malnutrition in both South Kordofan and neighboring Blue Nile state, where the SPLM-N also has a significant presence.

The health situation “is deteriorating rapidly,” warned Arno Ngutulu Lodi, the first secretary of the SPLM-N’s Civilian Authority in the state.

"We continue to see an increase in cases of malnutrition and, tragically, the death toll is rising as a result," he told the Sudan Tribune newspaper.

The New Fung region of the Blue Nile is particularly affected. In this region, authorities have confirmed at least 404 deaths and 1,223 cases of particularly severe malnutrition, and a total of five million people have been affected, or 4.4 million inhabitants, in addition to another 770,000 displaced by the war, half a million of whom are in New Fung.

The war has devastated the country's health system, with food and medicines being scarce to stem the tide of disease spreading across the country, gradually reaching the landing zone of Port Sudan.

In this regard, last Wednesday, the Steering Committee of the Sudanese Doctors' Union presented an estimate of deaths from dengue fever in the city of Omdurman alone that is much higher than that presented by the Sudanese health authorities for the entire country.

Compared to the estimate of just nine deaths nationwide presented this week by the Sudanese Ministry of Health, which is part of the army, this committee of local doctors says that in reality more than 250 people died in Omdurman, the country's third-largest city, and that more than 7,600 people were infected.

The war in Sudan broke out in April 2023 due to disagreements between the army and the paramilitaries over the inclusion of the latter in the power that emerged after the 2021 coup d'état in that country, which put an end to the attempt to democratize the state after the overthrow of former President Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

The conflict has caused around 20,000 deaths, 33,000 injuries, 7.9 million internally displaced people and 2.1 million refugees in other countries, according to the United Nations.