famine

Pope Francis is scheduled to fly first to Congo for a visit Jan. 31-Feb. 3 before meeting up in Juba, South Sudan, with Anglican Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury and the Rev. Iain Greenshields, moderator of the Church of Scotland.

In focus: Survivors of Uvalde mass shooting get tuition aid, vandals strike pregnancy center, Somalia at risk of famine

With starvation deaths mounting each day and nearly 900,000 people in famine conditions, there are fears that the current situation in Ethiopia will mirror the Great Famine of the 1980s, when more than 1 million people died of starvation.

Conflict is driving four countries — Yemen, South Sudan, Burkina Faso and northeastern Nigeria — into famine, the World Food Program warned.

Yemen’s health care system is collapsing as it struggles with the coronavirus pandemic.

Catholic and other faith-based aid groups are urging an end to fighting in Yemen, where three years of war have created a humanitarian crisis, including “the world’s largest food security emergency,” according to the United Nations.

Conflict and drought are threatening more than 20 million people in four countries with the prospect of famine, and the U.N. has called this food crisis the largest humanitarian crisis since the world body was formed more than 70 years ago.

Some 5 million people in South Sudan — half of its total population — are on the brink of starvation and a quarter of a million children are already severely malnourished, a representative from the U.S. bishops’ Catholic Relief Services said.