Humanitarian crisis on a massive scale

Abandoning a dying child is inconceivable to Irish parents. This is just one harrowing experience of Dr Hussein Sheikh Qassim in Somalia.

A LETHAL combination of drought and famine in the Horn of Africa is forcing some parents to do the unthinkable: abandon a sick child to focus on keeping the rest of the family alive.

Dr Hussein Sheikh Qassim, who works in the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)/Doctors Without Borders hospital in Marere, southern Somalia, has witnessed this tragic dilemma: