[{"bbox": [96, 152, 1136, 393], "category": "Text", "text": "infants, children and women in Afghanistan. Rates of acute malnutrition are high in 28 out of 34 provinces and a 21 percent increase in malnutrition is estimated from 2021. Afghanistan has one of the world's highest rates of stunting in children under five reaching 44.7%, whilst the rate of wasting, the extreme manifestation of severe acute malnutrition, reaches 3.7%²⁵. About 804,365 pregnant and lactating women are suffering from acute malnutrition. One in three adolescent girls suffers from anaemia. Only half of Afghan babies are exclusively breastfed in their first six months and only 12% of Afghan children aged 6-24 months receive the right variety of food in the quantity needed for their age. Malnutrition in children under-5 and pregnant and lactating women is expected to further rise by end of 2023, considering the drastic reduction in food assistance by the World Food Programme due to its severe funding crisis."}, {"bbox": [96, 403, 1136, 755], "category": "Text", "text": "Access to safe **water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH)** facilities has become more critical than ever. The vast majority of the people in Afghanistan drink unsafe water, often contaminated by sewage and deadly pathogens. Access to safe sanitation and hygiene, including basic toilets and handwashing supplies is similarly limited. Around 8 out of 10 Afghan people drink unsafe water, whilst 5 out of 10 do not have access to at least basic sanitation and hygiene facilities. 93% of children in Afghanistan (15.6 million children) live in areas of high, or extremely high, water vulnerability. Rising temperatures are rapidly altering precipitation patterns across Afghanistan, diminishing people's access to water and recurrent drought is drying surface-water sources, such as springs, while at the same time depleting groundwater levels for hand-dug and shallow wells. Nearly 4.2 million people practice open defecation. Around 94% of schools across Afghanistan lack access to basic handwashing facilities and around 35% of healthcare facilities lack access to at least basic drinking water supply. Furthermore, decades of war and political instability compounded by climate change have decimated most of the hydrological infrastructure of the country, due to the breakdown of water services especially in urban settings and increased contamination from wastewater."}, {"bbox": [96, 766, 1136, 1084], "category": "Text", "text": "As the world's leading opium producer, Afghanistan suffers from a drug abuse crisis exacerbated by extreme poverty, lack of future prospects, and post-traumatic stress due to conflict and social pressure. In 2015, out of 2,757 households sampled for the *Afghanistan national drug use survey*, 11% had tested positive for one or more drugs²⁶. Many drug users are forcibly locked up in so-called 'treatment centres' that are deficient in terms of adequate medical and mental care, food, sanitary facilities, heating, and meaningful rehabilitation and reintegration. With the lack of access to adequate health care services, especially in rural areas, some use of drugs also occurs in the context of self-medication for treatment of physical pain, as well as in case of psychological issues (e.g. stress, anxiety, depression, trauma). Drug use is associated with increased vulnerabilities in many areas of life, resulting in negative social and health consequences, such as co-occurring mental and physical disorders (including HIV, Hepatitis, and other infectious diseases), drug-related deaths, unemployment, stigmatisation, crime and violence (including domestic and family violence) affecting not only the drug users but families and entire communities."}, {"bbox": [96, 1097, 1136, 1313], "category": "Text", "text": "Mental health disorders in Afghanistan are exceptionally high for both adults and children, caused by decades of conflict and insecurity. About 66% of the Afghan population have experienced at least one traumatic event in their life, and 77% witnessed such an event. The major mental health disorders with high prevalence rates are psychological distress (47.7%), suicide ideation (7.3%), attempt (3.96%) and committing (3.43%), post traumatic stress disorder (5.3%), depression (4.9%) and generalised anxiety (2.8%). The mental health situation of children has become worrying with the prevalence of emotional problems at 39%, conduct disorders at 40.7%, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorders (ADHD) at 15.47%, and problems with peers at 51.81%. 11.5% of them are impaired in their daily life owing to mental health problems."}, {"bbox": [96, 1322, 1136, 1510], "category": "Text", "text": "Moreover, Afghanistan has one of the highest proportions of people with a disability in the world. Even though the overall security situation has improved, landmines, unexploded ordinance, local and domestic conflicts and accidents continue causing disability on a daily basis. About 80% of the adults live with some form of disability (24.6% mild, 40.4% moderate and 13.9% severe forms) as do 17.3% of the children aged between 2 and 17.²⁷ Severe disabilities are more prevalent among women and girls (14.9%). Human Rights Watch and other human rights organisations report that Afghan women and girls with disabilities face extreme barriers, entrenched discrimination, and sexual harassment in accessing assistance, education, employment and healthcare."}, {"bbox": [85, 1572, 736, 1599], "category": "Footnote", "text": "²⁵ MICS Afghanistan, Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey 2022-2023, UNICEF"}, {"bbox": [85, 1596, 477, 1622], "category": "Footnote", "text": "²⁶ https://dataunodc.un.org/content/country-list"}, {"bbox": [85, 1620, 520, 1646], "category": "Footnote", "text": "²⁷ From a study by the Asia Foundation (May 2020)"}, {"bbox": [1027, 1681, 1144, 1706], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 10 of 33"}]