In brief
The ongoing civil war in Sudan has created dire humanitarian conditions, as illustrated by a mother's heartbreaking decision to choose which of her twin daughters to provide life-saving antibiotics for. The war has left families destitute and children suffering from severe malnutrition, with the overwhelmed healthcare system unable to meet the critical needs of the affected population. The story underscores the tragic impact of conflict on innocent lives, especially children.
Touma hasn't eaten in days. She sits silently, her eyes glassy as she stares aimlessly across the hospital ward.
In her arms, motionless and severely malnourished, lies her three-year-old daughter, Masajed.
Touma seems numb to the cries of the other young children around her. I wish she would cry, the 25-year-old mother tells us, looking at her daughter. She hasn't cried in days.
Bashaer Hospital is one of the last functioning hospitals in Sudan's capital, Khartoum, devastated by the civil war which has been raging since April 2023. Many have travelled hours to get here for specialist care.
The malnutrition ward is filled with children who are too weak to fight disease, their mothers by their bedside, helpless. Cries here can't be soothed and each one cuts deep.
Touma and her family were forced to flee after fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) reached their home about 200km (125 miles) south-west of Khartoum.
[The RSF] took everything we owned - our money and our livestock - straight out of our hands, she says. We escaped with only our lives.
With no money or food, Touma's children began to suffer.
She looks stunned as she recounts their old life. In the past, our house was full of goodness. We had livestock, milk and dates. But now we have nothing.
Sudan is currently experiencing one of the world's worst humanitarian emergencies.
According to the UN, three million children under the age of five are acutely malnourished. The hospitals that are left are overwhelmed.
Bashaer Hospital offers care and basic treatment free of charge. However, the lifesaving medicines needed by the children in the malnutrition ward must be paid for by their families.
Masajed is a twin, she and her sister Manahil were brought to the hospital together. But the family could only afford antibiotics for one child.
Touma had to make the impossible choice – she chose Manahil.
I wish they could both recover and grow, her grief-stricken voice cracks, and that I could watch them walking and playing together as they did before.
I just want them both to get better, Touma says, cradling her dying daughter.
I am alone. I have nothing. I have only God.
Survival rates here are low. For the families on this ward, the war has taken everything. They have been left with nothing and no means to buy the medicines that would save their children.
As we leave, the doctor says none of the children in this ward will survive.
Across the whole of Khartoum, children's lives have been rewritten by the civil war.
