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Severe drought conditions, seasonal flooding, lingering conflicts, and Acute Watery Diarrhea (AWD) remain the key drivers of WASH needs in Somalia. Approximately, 6.6 million people in Somalia will need lifesaving WASH assistance in 2024, compared to 8.0 million people in 2023, representing 18% decrease in the number of people in need. This includes 1.4M displaced and 5.2M non-displaced vulnerable communities mainly in rural and few urban areas. According to the 2023 Multi-Cluster Needs Analysis (MSNA) carried out in 55 of the 74 districts of Somalia, WASH is one of the two main drivers of humanitarian needs across Somalia with significant regional variations. The MSNA indicated that 53% of the assessed people have unsecured access to drinking water services while 73% of HHs do not treat their drinking water.
On sanitation, the MSNA assessment indicated that 34% of the interviewed people defecate in the open while 30% of them rely on unhygienic, unimproved latrines. The populations groups of concern include newly displaced persons such as flood, black-lion operations and vulnerable IDPs living in over-crowded camps with poor WASH services.
While the scaled-up humanitarian aid coupled with good performance of 2023 Gu and Deyr rains brought back Somalia from the brink of starvation in 2023, the recent El-Nino triggered heavy rains and river overflows have worsened the situation. The Deyr floods have affected over 2.4M people across the country and damaged or contaminated hundreds of water points across the flood affected states, destroyed or inundated several thousands of latrines, forcing a significant portion of the population to rely on unsafe water sources or practice open defecation. In Juba-land alone over 10,000 latrines are inundated while almost 80% of drinking water supplies especially dug wells were inundated. The risk of water borne diseases in northern Gedo, Hirshebelle and Southwest states has sky-rocketed in December 2023 with over 385 cases of AWD (Acute watery diarrhea) and ‘suspected’ cholera reported. The AWD/Cholera cases are also expected to increase in the coming months as large number of the displaced communities face a chronic lack of safe drinking water and sanitation particularly during the harsh and long Jilal dry season.