‘Nothing is more shamelessly demanding

than an empty belly,

which commands attention,

even if the body is heavy with weariness,

the heart laden with grief.’

‘And waking early before the dawn was red

I heard my sons, who were with me, in their sleep

Weeping aloud and crying out for bread.’

Most often hunger does not take its toll in a dramatic way at all, with millions dying in a visible way (as happens with famines). Instead, endemic hunger kills in a more concealed manner. || People suffer from nutritional deficiency and from greater susceptibility to illness and disease. The insufficiency of food, along with the inadequacy of related commodities (such as health services, medical attention, clean water, etc.), enhances both morbidity and mortality. It all happens rather quietly without any clearly visible deaths from hunger. Indeed so quiet can this process be that it is easy to overlook that such a terrible sequence of deprivation, debilitation and decimation is taking place, covering – in different degrees – much of the population of the poorer countries in the world.