UN organization pauses life-saving treatments in African nation

(MENAFN) The World Food Program (WFP) has been forced to suspend life-saving nutrition treatments for 650,000 women and children in Ethiopia due to a severe lack of funding, the agency announced on Tuesday. WFP Ethiopia Country Director Zlatan Milisic said the organization has reached a critical point and warned that food assistance for 3.6 million Ethiopians could run out by June without immediate donor support.

“We had no choice but to halt treatment for over half a million malnourished women and children because we’ve simply run out of food supplies and financial resources,” Milisic said during a briefing in Geneva.

He stressed the urgency of the situation, stating, “Millions of Ethiopians are just one step away from disaster. We need immediate and generous contributions from the international community to protect the most vulnerable.”

The WFP had aimed to support two million Ethiopian mothers and children in 2025 but is currently facing a $222 million funding gap for the April to September period. Despite continued support from some governments and private donors, overall contributions have fallen sharply.

The agency, which typically relies on funding from 15 to 20 major donors—including the United States—has seen many reduce or delay their contributions in 2025. Although the WFP was not affected by the global aid freeze enacted under U.S. President Donald Trump, donations have remained insufficient this year.

Ethiopia is grappling with multiple overlapping crises. The country is still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and a devastating two-year civil war in the Tigray region that ended in 2022. Recent outbreaks of violence in Amhara and Oromia have displaced hundreds of thousands more, and southeastern Ethiopia continues to suffer from prolonged drought.
Meanwhile, the conflict in neighboring Sudan has pushed more refugees into Ethiopia, worsening the humanitarian burden.

In 2023, both the WFP and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) paused food aid to Tigray after reports of large-scale diversion of supplies.

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