Friday, Apr 19, 2024 | Last Update : 04:44 AM IST

  World   Middle East  17 May 2017  Yemen: Cholera outbreak kills 124, more than 7 million in high-risk areas

Yemen: Cholera outbreak kills 124, more than 7 million in high-risk areas

AGENCIES
Published : May 17, 2017, 8:49 am IST
Updated : May 17, 2017, 12:37 pm IST

The World Health Organization said last month that fewer than 45 percent of health facilities in Yemen are now fully functioning.

Cholera outbreak in Yemen (Photo: AFP)
 Cholera outbreak in Yemen (Photo: AFP)

United Nations: The UN humanitarian coordinator in Yemen said a cholera outbreak has killed 124 people over the past two weeks.

Jamie McGoldrick told reporters Monday that another 11,100 people were believed to have been infected, and that medicine was arriving. But he also urged donor countries to fulfil more than $1 billion in aid pledges made in Geneva last month.

A Saudi-led coalition has been battling Shiite Houthi rebels in Yemen since March 2015, in a war that has killed more than 10,000 civilians.

The World Health Organization said last month that fewer than 45 percent of health facilities in Yemen are now fully functioning, and that the flow of “essential medicines” has fallen by nearly 70 percent.

The cholera outbreak in Yemen was announced by Yemen’s Ministry of Public Health and Population on Oct. 6, 2016.

Yemen, the impoverished Arab country in the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, has been involved in a civil war since two years ago.

The war pits Iranian-allied dominant Houthi movement, backed by forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, against their foe of Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

Tags: un humanitarian, cholera outbreak, world health organization
Location: Switzerland, Geneve, Geneve