Her mournful cry was so faint, tiny Hamdi Ahmed could barely be heard above the other wailing children in the malnutrition ward.

Looking at the desperately ill Somalian girl’s face racked with pain, I could almost see her life slipping away before my very eyes.

Limp in the arms of her mother, the six-month-old weighed less than 8lb, the same as an average British baby at birth – and less than half the weight she should have been.

Born at the epicentre of the worst Somalian drought since 1950 – it has not rained for three years – Hamdi had been battling starvation since the day she was born.

Her head was covered in white blotches, her mouth red with a sore rash, and her eyes painfully sealed over.

It made me wince instinctively just to look at her.

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In drought-stricken Somalia, Hamdi was the worst of many malnutrition cases I witnessed .

Yet, back in the comfort of Britain, news of her death less than a week later still came as a terrible shock.

A child at the Garowe camp (
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A youngster peers out from camp (
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Doctors had tried everything to save her, but apparently she was already too far gone when she had been brought in by mum Fadumo, 28.

Across the East African nation, nearly 363,000 vulnerable children are chronically ill through malnutrition, while six million people are in need of food aid.

In total more than 20 million people have been afflicted by an unprecedented food crisis across four countries, including South Sudan, Nigeria and Yemen.

In the Horn of Africa, drought is also causing families in northern Kenya and Ethiopia to go without food and water.

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The tragic fate of children like Hamdi graphically illustrates the appalling reality behind these incomprehensible statistics.

I was told of her death late last week by local Save The Children staff. It was devastating news for them too.

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Last night doctor Said Hamed, who did his best to treat the ailing youngster, told me: “Hamdi’s case is one of the worst I have seen since this drought started. It has been getting progressively worse since she arrived at the clinic.

“There was no way that we could properly rehydrate her.

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Children stare out from rubbish-strewn wasteland (
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The makeshift refugee camp at Garowe, Puntland (
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“She could not swallow. She also had an infection to her gastro-intestinal system related to malnutrition.

“Her mother is also very malnourished and therefore she has not been able to breastfeed,” he explained.

“When we pronounced Hamdi dead she was so distraught.

“Afterwards we helped her with the burial ritual. The little girl was wrapped in muslin and placed in a fresh grave in the ground near here. All of us were very, very sad when she died. It is a terrible thing.”

Fadumo’s exhausting three-day journey to the stabilisation clinic from her remote community to get help for her daughter had been in vain. Dr Hamed told me the poor child had been sick for three months. Her immune system had essentially given up.

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Living days away from the nearest medical help, by the time her mother had started the long trek towards refugee camps in Garowe it was already too late.

And as Britain’s main aid agencies launched a major appeal to raise funds for the worst food crisis in decades, grief-stricken Fadumo was burying her youngest child in a tiny grave in the desert near the clinic.

It is one of more than 100 have been dug and covered over with mounds of stones in the last few weeks, between piles of rubbish and animal carcasses.

The horn of Africa is suffering a huge humanitarian crisis (
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To see any child suffering the pains of acute malnutrition is upsetting. To observe the pain Hamdi was suffering was almost unbearable.

However, there is some good news, positive signs that the relentless efforts of local medics are saving lives.

Another child I met in the outlying desert camp of Shahda, two-year-old Abdulrahman Mahamud, is thankfully on the mend after receiving treatment at an emergency clinic.

He was diagnosed with pneumonia and his brother Abullahi with bronchitis following a 100-mile march across the parched plains in search of food and medicine. Both contracted the complications because of severe malnutrition when their family lost all its livestock to the drought.

Freshly dug for victim of drought (
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When I met frail Abdulrahman his wrists were so thin that when concerned doctors took measurements, he was marked down as being in the
“red section” – meaning his state was so bad it was feared he could die. Yet in the space of a week, the circumference of his wrists have increased by 1.5cm, happily showing he is putting on weight and winning his fight for survival.

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It is for children like Hamdi and Abdulrahman that Britain’s Disasters Emergency Committee launched one of its biggest ever appeals . Thirteen aid agencies came together to launch a television appeal for donations as the crisis gets worse day by day.

Sir Mo Farah, who grew up in Somalia, backed the appeal, saying: “As a father of four, it hurts to see children without food and water, but this is a reality being faced by parents in East Africa right now.

“The drought is really bad and there are millions of children at risk of starvation. I was born in Somalia and it breaks my heart to hear stories of suffering.”

Tom in the barren desert at Garowe (
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Save The Children’s staff in Somalia have been so affected by the unfolding catastrophe they are sacrificing part of their salaries to buy vital equipment for the clinic in which Hamdi died.

The charity’s chief executive Kevin Watkins, who travelled to Somalia with the Mirror, made an impassioned plea for help: “This is a life and death moment for tens of thousands of children. We have to act now to save these innocent lives.”

HOW YOU CAN HELP

The Disasters Emergency Committee has launched one of its biggest ever appeals. Thirteen aid agencies came together in a TV appeal for donations. Money raised by the DEC appeal will help those affected in Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Sudan. Britain’s Department for International Development pledged to match every pound donated up to £5million.

To donate to the East Africa Crisis Appeal, visit www.dec.org.uk