Reliable figures are hard to come by in Gaza and the Sudan, but there is no doubt that children are dying like flies in both those places. That I can say children “dying like flies” is testament to the hardening of our feelings, a consequence of too many months of seeing and hearing of the wanton murdering of children in those countries.
According to Haaretz, the longest running newspaper printed in Israel, 16,506 Palestinian children have been killed so far by the Israeli Defence Force. The breakdown by age is: Babies (under one year), over 900, of which 274 are newborns; toddlers, 1 to 5 years, 4,300; children, 6 to 12 years, over 6,100 and adolescents, 13 to 17, over 5,000. That total figure has now probably reached over 20,000. It does not take into account the number of injured.
In May this year, UNICEF reported that more than 50,000 children had been killed or injured. In addition, over 39,000 children have lost one or both parents. Some 17,000 have lost both. Children without parents. Without eyes. Without arms. Without legs. And without hope. Even if the killing stops now, what will happen to them?
As in Gaza, researchers are barred from the Sudan. Morbidity and mortality data are difficult to confirm. However, it is known that more than 10 million children have been displaced from their homes, exposed to battles, bombings and missile strikes, as well as direct attacks since the war began in 2023.
“Children in Sudan have suffered unimaginably – they have seen killings, massacres, bullet-littered streets, dead bodies and shelled homes while they live with the all-too-real fear that they, themselves, could be killed, injured, recruited to fight or subject to sexual violence,” says Save the Children.
More than 770,000 children are expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition this year and a “staggering” 35% of children were suffering from acute malnutrition, Médicins Sans Frontieres (MSF), December 2024.
Nearer home in Haiti, the situation is threatening. Three million will require urgent humanitarian assistance this year. Another 1.2 million children live under the constant threat of armed violence. More than 500,000 children have been displaced and have had their education disrupted due to recurrent population displacement and school closures.
To keep our minds off these terrible figures, as we sit in our homes sipping morning coffee and reading about the latest bacchanal, perhaps one could concentrate intellectually on the effect lack of food has on the body. People may be asking a terrible but timely question: What is it like to starve to death? It’s an important question because if this goes on, soon there will be more children dying of malnutrition than by bombs or sniper shots to the head.
There are five phases to starving to death. Basically, we eat our own body for food in order to generate energy and stay alive. And as the situation worsens, the body prioritises essential functions.
Everyone has experienced the first phase. You feel hungry. You eat, and the body uses some of the carbohydrate eaten for energy, or if more is needed, the sugar stored in the liver, to maintain brain, heart, lung, muscle, kidney, intestinal function, etc.
If you do not eat, over the next two or three days, your carbohydrate stores become depleted, hunger sets in again and because the blood sugar is low, one feels tired or light-headed or dizzy. The body now starts using fats as its energy source (2nd stage).
By the third day without food the body begins the third phase of starvation. The liver begins to convert fats into ketones. Ketones are energy-rich molecules that serve as emergency fuel for the brain, as the body endeavours to maintain clear thinking in order to survive.
After some more days, the body starts to lower the metabolic rate to conserve energy. Heart rate and blood pressure drop. People cut back on physical activity instinctively but also because their bodies become weaker (4th phase).
The depletion of fat stores can take anywhere from a few weeks to months, depending on a person’s fat reserves. When there is no more fat, the body begins to break down protein from its muscles and uses it to fuel its energy needs (5th phase). This is the point where extreme weakness and muscle wasting appear. The legs may swell because there is not enough protein in the blood, since it’s being used for fuel and the skin becomes dry, the eyes sunken, weight loss is now extreme and the picture is the one we see on our TV.
The description of that picture used to be called Biafran. I suppose it will now be called Gazan or Sudanan or even Haitian. Death from cardiac failure or lung infection or kidney failure is only days away.
