Highlights
Approximately 4 million people, including 1.9 million children in rural Zimbabwe are at risk of food insecurity during the peak of the hunger season according to the Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment (ZimVAC) report from July 2016.
During the period January to June 2016 a total of 2,896 children under five were admitted and treated for severe acute malnutrition (SAM) under the community management of acute malnutrition programme (CMAM) in the 15 most drought affected districts. 428 of these children were admitted in the month of June 2016.
According to the Child Protection Rapid Assessment (CPRA) conducted in July 2016, child protection trends indicate an increase in protection violations, mainly child neglect, child labor, separation of children, sexual exploitation and physical abuse as a result of the drought. UNICEF, the Government and NGO Partners are continuing their efforts to protect the most vulnerable children, particularly girls, from violence, abuse and exploitation, and are working to strengthen the capacity of child protection systems to provide timely and appropriate response.
Based on weekly epidemiological data, there was a marginal increase in new typhoid cases during the reporting month. To date, 1,680 typhoid cases have been reported in the country, out of which 74 have been laboratory confirmed, with 6 typhoid related deaths reported.
UNICEF is conducting a KAP survey to determine the risk factors for the continued typhoid outbreak.
Situation Overview & Humanitarian Needs
The deteriorating economic situation is further compounding vulnerabilities of the food and nutrition insecure population as negative impacts continue to affect vulnerable women and children in Zimbabwe, with the situation expected to worsen in the coming months. With regards to the nutrition situation of children, in the month of June, Midlands, Matabeleland South and North provinces consistently reported a high number of SAM cases each week as compared to the same period last year. The districts reporting an increase in the number of SAM cases were Gokwe South, Zvishavane, Beitbridge, Matobo, and Tsholotsho. According to the results of the ZimVAC assessment of July 2016, levels of acute malnutrition have deteriorated further, with Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) rates ranging from 5% to 17% in the 20 most affected districts. Four districts reported GAM rates above 10% namely; Kariba (17.3%), Gweru (13.1%), Shamva (12.3%) and Binga (11%) as shown in figure 1 below. The nutrition situation is expected to deteriorate further during the peak hunger period. UNICEF with support from the Humanitarian Community is scaling up its ongoing response interventions to respond to the deteriorating situation of women and children.
According to the Rural WASH Information Management System (RWIMS), an estimated 11,000 sources (boreholes, deep wells, shallow wells) have been reported to have a reduced their yield with over 750 perennial sources also reporting reduction in their capacity or are drying up due to the drought situation, reducing access to safe water for approximately 2.3 million people including 1.1 million children. A preliminary assessment of access to safe water at institutions indicates that over 1,100 schools and over 125 health facilities have a reduced water production capacity from their main water sources due to the drought situation. According to the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA), the availability of water in dams across Zimbabwe’s seven catchment areas was 51.9% in July which is around 18% below the expected capacity at this time of the year. The most critical catchments are Save and Runde which are recording storage capacity levels of 48.3% and 24.9% respectively. These two catchments cover most of Masvingo and Manicaland Provinces and parts of Matabeleland South, Midlands, and Mashonaland East.