Market News

By Ahmed Kingimi

• Over 30 killed, 1 million affected, mostly in camps without food and clean water
• Floods caused by dam burst following heavy rainfall in Sahel region
• Aid agencies warn of waterborne disease outbreak, overwhelmed by crisis

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, Sept 16 (Reuters) - (This Sept. 16 story has been corrected to remove Goemaere as the source of the statement that the insurgency had driven people from their farms, in paragraph 12)
People in Nigeria's flood-hit northeastern Borno state are struggling to get medical care as overwhelmed aid agencies warn of an outbreak of waterborne disease following the worst floods to hit the region in three decades.
More than 30 people have been killed by the floods, which authorities say affected about one million people, most of whom are housed in camps without food and clean water.

The deluge threatens not only the health and safety of the displaced but puts a strain on aid agencies and government resources, exacerbating an already critical humanitarian crisis.
The floods in Borno, the birthplace of Boko Haram militants in the Lake Chad basin, started when a dam burst its walls following heavy rainfall that has also caused floods in Cameroon, Chad, Mali and Niger, all part of Africa's Sahel region that usually receives little rain.

In the last two weeks of August, more than 1.5 million people were displaced across 12 countries in West and Central Africa due to floods, and about 465 have been killed, according to the United Nations humanitarian affairs office.
Over the weekend, an additional 50,000 people were displaced in northeastern Nigeria as the floods intensified, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said on Monday.
"The situation in the Sahel and Lake Chad region is increasingly dire, as the compounding effects of conflict, displacement and climate change take a severe toll on vulnerable populations," said Hassane Hamadou, NRC's Central and West Africa regional director.