Funding to address acute malnutrition in parts of Somalia has declined by more than 80 percent in 2026 compared with the previous year, Doctors Without Borders said on Tuesday, as a survey of 888 households across 14 displacement sites in Baidoa found that one in four children was severely malnourished and one-third of families reported surviving on one meal a day.
Funding to address acute malnutrition in parts of Somalia has fallen more than 80 percent this year, Doctors Without Borders reports
Funding to address acute malnutrition in parts of Somalia has declined by more than 80 percent in 2026 compared with the previous year, Doctors Without Borders said on Tuesday, as a survey of 888 households across 14 displacement sites in Baidoa found that one in four children was severely malnourished and one-third of families reported surviving on one meal a day.
Mitchell Sangma, a health adviser with Doctors Without Borders, said the United States reduced its support to aid agencies in Somalia from $70 million in the previous year to no funding this year. Other Western donors have also cut contributions, according to Sangma.
Doctors Without Borders said it admitted 22,000 nutrition cases in 2026 as of the report's publication, a figure more than 80 percent higher than the same period the previous year. The organization said it had screened more than 21,000 children under five in Baidoa since the start of the year and found acute malnutrition rates of approximately 50 percent. Acute malnutrition involves sudden weight loss and is described as life-threatening.
In the July survey of 14 displacement sites in Baidoa, only two percent of families reported being able to afford three meals a day.
Somalia has experienced repeated failed rainy seasons that devastated crops, killed livestock, and depleted water supplies. Conflict and insecurity have compounded the situation by disrupting livelihoods and limiting access to food, health care, and aid, according to the report.
In February, the Somali government and the United Nations stated that approximately 6.5 million people in the country faced acute hunger due to drought. The United Nations also recorded more than half a million people displaced in Somalia during the first three months of 2026, with drought driving most of the movement; women and children accounted for about 85 percent of those displaced.
Doctors Without Borders said approximately $300 million is currently available for Somalia from donors, compared with $2.2 billion provided in 2022 during a comparable drought situation. Aid agencies have described the reduced funding as constraining the response to a crisis that is drawing comparisons to Somalia's 2022 near-famine.
Allara Ali, the project coordinator for Doctors Without Borders in Somalia, said action was needed immediately to prevent loss of lives and that a famine declaration should not be required before a response is mounted.
- Which specific Western donors beyond the United States have reduced funding, and by how much
- Whether the Somali government has made any independent funding commitments to address malnutrition
- What criteria would trigger a formal famine declaration in Somalia
- How the 22,000 admitted nutrition cases are distributed geographically across Somalia
- What share of the approximately $300 million available has been disbursed or committed
- Whether any donors have announced plans to restore or increase funding
- The mortality rate among severely malnourished children in the affected displacement sites
- The methodology used to screen children for malnutrition in the Baidoa survey