One of the worst droughts in Pakistan's history has triggered "alarmingly high" levels of malnutrition and disease in the hardest hit areas where people have been forced to drink salty or contaminated water, the Red Cross said. Women, especially those pregnant or breastfeeding, and children are particularly vulnerable to diarrhoea, vomiting and fever brought on by a lack of safe drinking water in the worst affected areas of the southern Sindh and Balochistan provinces.
An estimated 5 million people are affected by the drought, which was caused by unseasonably high temperatures and below average monsoon rainfall, both of which are influenced by the El Niño weather phenomenon, the Red Cross said. Conditions have recently deteriorated in the drought affected areas with malnutrition rates increasing to 30 percent, the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.
The water table has dropped in most valleys and low-lying areas, and food production in the affected areas has dropped by 34 per cent, according to the IFRC.
The Pakistan Meteorological Department forecasts that the situation will continue to deteriorate over the next four years, in part due to climate change.
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