Suffering in Silence

In the world, there are many dangerous places that thousands must flee from each day. There are countries where half of the children are starving. Do you know where this is happening? If your answer is "no", you're not alone. Supporting people in need is very difficult if most of the world simply looks away.

In this era of social media and 24-hour access to news, this question has become a truism for many people. What we see on the screen, via the internet or hear over the radio becomes our reality. If an event happens and we don't hear about it, it simply doesn't exist in our consciousness. The sad truth is that the lives of over 132 million people around the world were threatened by crises and catastrophes last year, regardless of whether we heard about it or not. Many of the humanitarian crises affected people without anyone being aware of it. They suffer in silence, away from the public eye.

The world had many crises to deal with in 2019 too; the people affected by these need action and support from us all.

The war in Yemen, the Syrian crisis, the cyclones Idai and Kenneth in Mozambique and the impact of the climate change around Lake Chad are just a few of these. In addition, a multitude of other catastrophes and conflicts also occurred, but these are hardly seen in the media. The consequences for the people affected by these are huge: Time and time again, we have seen how important public awareness is for mobilizing funds and exerting public pressure on political decision-makers.

CARE, the international relief organization, is therefore publishing its "Suffering in Silence" report for the fourth year in a row.

Each year, this study focuses on ten crises that each affect over a million people but have not received much attention from the general public. "Suffering in Silence" is a call to the global community that asks us to act in order to save the people that are suffering in silence in these forgotten crisis zones.