WFP and UNICEF Launch Emergency Appeals to Help Over 600,000 Women and Children in Namibia

A worsening AIDS epidemic, severe poverty and erratic weather have caused more than 600,000 Namibian women and children to be in desperate need of food, UNICEF and the World Food Program (WFP) said today. "A swift response is needed to contain the crisis and give the government time to build up its capacity during this acute emergency," said Mike Sackett, WFP's regional director for Southern Africa, in a statement. Namibia suffers deep poverty and perennial food shortages, now compounded by the HIV/AIDS pandemic and three years of erratic weather in the north of the country. Namibia's HIV rate has soared from just 4 percent in 1992 to 22 percent -- the seventh-highest rate in the world. At least 120,000 children are estimated to have lost one or both parents to AIDS.

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