SANAA, Dec. 28 (Saba) –Cholera, which can kill within hours if left untreated, reappeared in Yemen.
Cholera, a potentially fatal disease that has come to symbolize the humanitarian crisis of the war in Yemen, has surged again in the country, with some areas hit by as many as 2,000 suspected or confirmed cases per week.
The United Nations had announced that 2.2 million suspected cases of cholera have been registered in Yemen, between the beginning of the outbreak in 2017 until mid-November 2019.
Last October, the World Health Organisation announced that it had registered 913 cholera deaths in Yemen during the period from the beginning of 2019 until the end of last September. The organisation said in a report that a total of 696,537 suspected cases of cholera have been detected in Yemen in 2019 alone.
The latest surge in cholera cases threatens to further complicate the already dire humanitarian situation.
Two years ago Yemen suffered the world’s largest cholera outbreak, with more than 1 million cases. Although the disease was brought under control, medical organizations operating in the country have continued to see cases in almost every region.
Doctors without Borders said that its facilities had admitted more than 7,900 patients with suspected cholera in Amran, Hajjah, Ibb and Taiz governorates in western Yemen .
Staff at the shabby and ill-equipped hospitals that are still functional amid the continued violence are at their wits' end, unable to cope with the rising number of patients.
Cholera, which causes potentially deadly diarrhoea, is contracted by ingesting food or water contaminated with a bacterium carried in human faeces and spread through poor sanitation and dirty drinking water.
Damage to sewage systems, the electricity grid and piping have left Yemen's water supplies vulnerable to contamination.
The war in the Arab world’s poorest country has also left millions suffering from food and medical care shortages and has pushed the country to the brink of famine.
Mona.M