Afghanistan: where hundreds of children are dying every day

Munira, one and a half years-old, has been identified as malnourished by the doctors at Aqcha District Hospital, Afghanistan.

She's now receiving weekly food supplements from the hospital, which Save the Children support. The Foreign Secretary, who spoke at the Kabul conference along with other high profile leaders, announced a refocusing of UK aid, increasing aid to Afghanistan by 40%.

Patrick Watt, Head of development policy at Save the Children, welcomed the increase but warned it should not all be concentrated in Helmand province, but distributed across other parts of the country that are in equal need.

“There are 360 districts in Afghanistan crippled by poverty,” said Watt.

“British aid currently reaches only 80 of them and most of those are areas where British troops are stationed. The British government is right that tackling poverty is critical to security in Afghanistan and around the world, but the focus on bringing aid to areas only affected by conflict is misguided.”

“Far from the war and away from the attention of the world’s media, hundreds of children are dying every day from diarrhoea and pneumonia in Afghanistan because they can’t get to a doctor or because they haven’t enough food to eat,” said Watt.

A further danger is posed when using the military to deliver aid. Employing soldiers to the job of aid workers further endangers the lives of already vulnerable children by making military targets of their schools and hospitals.

Afghanistan has both the highest child mortality rate and the highest fertility rate in the world. The true scale of the crisis facing these children is hidden by the international community’s focus on the conflict:

* 25% of Afghani children will die before reaching their fifth birthday

* More than half of all children are stunted, and one in three children under five is underweight

* Maternal mortality rates are the second highest in the world – an Afghan woman is 225 times more likely to die in childbirth than a woman in the UK.

* Decades of war, combined with earthquakes, droughts, floods, landslides and extreme winters have been devastating for the Afghan population, 70% of whom live in poverty. Life expectancy is just 44 and most people have no access to clean water or proper sanitation.

“Afghanistan is the worst place in the world to be a child. Save the Children welcomes an increase of aid that might help these children but we need to make sure this increase isn’t funded at the expense of other poor countries that aren’t a current military priority for the British government,” Patrick Watt said.

“There are lots of other places where children need help and the British government must commit to reaching them. Complete transparency for how British aid money is spent is essential," Watt continued.

Save the Children has worked in Afghanistan since 1976, providing healthcare, feeding malnourished children, protecting vulnerable children and helping to get children back into school, working in some of the country’s poorest areas such as Kandahar and Uruzgan.