Yemen : 23 dead as cholera epidemic hits southwestern province

Abdul Rahim Samai, director of the Public Health and Population Department in Taiz province, said that nearly 5,488 suspected cholera cases have been registered since early January.

The health authorities recorded 335 cases of confirmed cholera, 23 of which have resulted in the death of the patients, he said.

All the deaths have been recorded since the beginning of March and that 80 percent of the suspected cholera cases were recorded only during this month in various areas of Taiz province, the health official confirmed.

Two years after Yemen suffered its worst cholera outbreak, the number of reported suspected cases of cholera and acute watery diarrhea spiked in recent weeks.
Data collected by the Yemeni Ministry of Public Health and Population with the support of the World Health Organization (WHO) indicates that 109,000 suspected cases and 190 associated deaths were recorded between Jan. 1, 2019 and March 17.

About one-third of the cases are children under age five, according to the statements revealed by the organizations.

The cholera outbreak has been spreading in Yemen since October 2016, but the number of cholera cases resurged after April 2017 as the country's sewer system stopped working due to war.

The internal conflict raging between the Yemeni government forces and the Houthi rebels has entered into its fifth year this week.
The epidemic in Yemen has set the world's highest record with the infection of 1 million people and over 2,000 have been confirmed dead since 2017, according to the WHO.