Unless the administration moves swiftly to secure safe passage for food and medicine in the affected regions. up to 5 million lives could be lost. And tragically. in both countries. the impending famine is entirely avoidable. The food stocks exist and the international community has the capacity to deliver the assistance. But in Ethiopia and Sudan. the governments and the opposing rebels have placed military obJectives far above humanitarian concerns. Less than 6 years have passed since we last viewed the devastating footage of walking skeletons dying in the refugee camps of Ethiopia. The crisis is upon us once again. with even more devastating implications. In the northern Ethiopian provinces of Eritrea.