Afghanistan is on the verge of a widespread hunger that relief groups fear threatens to kill 1 million children this winter, just four months after the Taliban seized power.
Such figure would surpass the projected total number of Afghan civilians who have died as a result of the war over the last two decades.
While malnutrition has been a problem in Afghanistan for decades, the country's food situation has deteriorated dramatically in recent months.
An estimated 22.8 million people - more than half the population - are anticipated to experience potentially life-threatening food shortages this winter, a United Nations World Food Program and Food and Agriculture Organization report showed. Some 8.7 million of those are on the verge of famine - the most severe stage of a food catastrophe.
This level of widespread hunger is the most devastating symptom of Afghanistan's economic collapse since the Taliban took power.
Almost instantly, billions of dollars in foreign aid that had bolstered the previous Western-backed administration evaporated, and U.S. sanctions against the Taliban cut the country off from the global financial system, weakening Afghan banks and obstructing humanitarian relief efforts.
Millions of Afghans - from construction workers to physicians and teachers - have gone months without a consistent salary.
Food and other basic essentials have become out of reach for many families in the country. Skinny toddlers and weary mothers have crowded hospital malnutrition units, leaving many of those facilities devoid of medical supplies previously provided by donor aid.
Exacerbating the country's ongoing economic troubles is one of the worst droughts in decades, which has resulted in withered fields, starving farm animals, and dried up irrigation systems.
According to United Nations officials, Afghanistan's wheat crop is anticipated to be up to a quarter below average this year. Many farmers have abandoned their land in rural areas, which account for around 70% of the population.
Now, as winter season slowly sets in and humanitarian organizations warn that up to 1 million children may perish, the crisis has the potential to be troubling for both the new Taliban government and the U.S., which is under increasing pressure to ease economic restrictions that are aggravating the situation.
"We must disentangle politics from the humanitarian need," Mary Ellen McGroarty, Afghanistan Country Director for the WFP, said.
"The millions of women, children, and men caught up in Afghanistan's current predicament are innocent victims sentenced to a winter of sheer misery and potentially, death," she said.
