Seven-month-old Samera’s dark, saucer-shaped eyes gaze forth as a nurse lovingly cradles her head and cleans her extremely frail body.
She is one of the innocent victims of the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, suffering from severe acute malnutrition, one of the leading causes of death among children under the age of five.
Temor, her 12-year-old brother, is anxious and feels powerless.
He states, “I would want bread and milk for my tiny sister.” My mother and father are out of work, and we have nothing to eat or drink. Sometimes we can find bread, and other times we cannot.
Temor lives with his mother Sonia, 36, two brothers, and Samera in a one-room house in a rural northern Afghanistan town.
The father of Samera has traveled to Iran in search of employment, but they have not yet received payment.
Samera weighs just 8 pounds, and her lifeline has been Save the Children’s Mobile Health Centre, one of 66 in the nation, where she is given a special peanut-based paste containing important vitamins.
Temor adds, “I wish I was older so I could work and earn money since food costs have tripled and there is little or no job for grownups.” I wish I could attend both school and the mosque.
We want for our circumstances to improve. We would want to have water here.