Report Says 5,000-Plus Deaths Under Ethiopia’s Tigray Blockade

Nearly 1,500 people died of malnutrition in just part of Ethiopia’s blockaded Tigray region over a four-month period last year, including more than 350 young children.

This is according to a new report by the region’s health bureau which cites more than 5,000 blockade-related deaths in all from hunger and disease in the largest official death toll yet associated with the country’s war.

Head of Tigray’s health bureau, Hagos Godefay, told Newsmen that Deaths are alarmingly increasing, including from easily preventable diseases like rabies as medicines run out or expire,.

His report on the findings, published Wednesday by the independent Ethiopia Insight, says 5,421 deaths were confirmed in Tigray between July and October in an assessment by his bureau and some international aid groups.

It was the first such assessment since the war between Tigray and Ethiopian forces began in November 2020, he said.

The deaths were overwhelmingly from malnutrition, infectious disease and non-communicable diseases as the health bureau and partners sought to gauge the effects on Tigray’s population of its health system being largely destroyed by combatants.

The mortality assessment covered just roughly 40% of Tigray, he said, since occupation of some areas by combatants and the lack of fuel caused by the blockade has limited data-gathering and aid delivery.

Hagos said since the magnitude of the destruction and health crisis in the inaccessible areas is undoubtedly high, the survey is bound to underreport the real extent of the crisis.

Ethiopia’s government cut off almost all access to food aid, medical supplies, cash and fuel in June last year when the Tigray forces regained control of the region.